Of Schadenfreude and Satire
by PointlessKnife
Summary: Because even those born to be heroes can be made into villains, given the right circumstances. All it takes is a stroke of bad luck and everything will unravel, and Izuku has always been known for his bad luck. One unfortunate encounter leaves Izuku the furthest thing from quirkless when the League of Villains decide they need a new Noumu...
1. Chapter 1

Izuku Midoriya had not been having a good day. The day was contesting to be one of the worst in his life, second only to the day he'd been proclaimed quirkless and had his dreams shatter at his feet, and it had started like any other day.

It'd just gone downhill very, very quickly.

 _"This will only hurt for less than a minute."_

He'd been reminded of how utterly powerless he was. He'd been unable to breathe, when the villain attacked, and even hours later, even with the complete exhaustion dragging at his body, he could remember the icy fear that had flooded him, the way his heartbeat had echoed in his ears. He could remember with perfect clarity the frantic way he'd fought as he clawed at the slime, the way that the darkness had crawled across his vision.

He wasn't about to forget _dying_ anytime soon.

He wasn't going to forget being powerless, helpless, _useless_ ever again.

 _"Then it'll all be over."_

And even meeting All Might had gone so horrible wrong. He'd always associated his idol with hope and safety and _smiles_.

So some small part of him had dared to hope that it would be the one he looked up to more than anything that would reassure him. That the hero he'd looked up to since forever would be the one to let him know that not giving up, that always fighting for his dreams was worth it.

 _"It's okay to dream, just keep it realistic, okay?"_

How foolish.

He was the least amazing, he remembered all too well. He was just stubborn, and there was nothing about his dream, once so vibrant to him, that was special or unique.

He was just _Deku_ after all.

He wouldn't make a difference no matter what he did. Even if he tried to save someone, then it would never be 'heroic'. Only dangerous because he didn't have a quirk.

Only dangerous because he was a liability.

 _"What were you thinking? It was dangerous to run out there without a quirk!"_

And he'd never change, would he?

He was always the one who couldn't do anything.

He'd tried holding on to his dream, he really had. But his dream had been trampled on for too long by too many people, and now it was stomped out of shape and just all _wrong_.

 _"If you want a quirk so badly, why don't you take a swan dive of the roof? Maybe you'll be reborn with a quirk in the next life!"_

He never really had a chance, did he?

Just hours before, he would have wanted to cry, scream in denial, anything... But now... Now he was just tired. He wanted nothing more than to just go home and sleep.

(And maybe wake up and find that this whole thing had been an awful, awful, dream.)

So he trudged onwards, unaware of the two people racing to find him.

One was the pro hero, All Might, desperate to find the boy, desperate now that he had found his successor.

And another was a villain, who had merely a list of quirkless people, and knowing that he'd need one for Sensei's experiments. Izuku Midoriya just happened to be the closest.

So Izuku just trudged wearily onwards, ignorant of the two searching for him, ignorant of the path he was taking, and really, just wishing that he could cry to mourn his dream.

* * *

Kurogiri was normally the most reasonable of those he worked with. He prided himself on being the voice of reason when tensions were high or Tomura was in the midst of another temper tantrum. He was formal and polite.

All of this by no means meant that he was nice.

He'd seen the news. He'd seen All Might save the two boys, and had dismissed it as a simple act of heroism. Then he'd seen the way All Might had escaped the reporters- unusually abrupt, even for him.

He'd seen the quirkless boy- the one Sensei would need for some tests- leave and had wondered...

But to see All Might searching the streets at the exact same time in the exact same place...

Well, he had an idea.

He glanced at the list in his hand- a list of all of the individuals listed as quirkless and the one name circled, and shrugged.

Sensei's orders took priority.

He found the boy first. Being able to warp had its advantages. He wasn't entirely sure if All Might truly was searching for Izuku Midoriya, but his gut feeling was never wrong.

The worst of it was that the boy seemed to sense him somehow, as the small child relfexively flinched out of the way.

It didn't matter. One quick hit to the back of the boy's head took care of any problems, and soon the boy was lying limply on the pavement, a book falling from his slack hand.

Curiously, Kurogiri flicked through it.

Well, the boy was certainly talented and smart. And one look at an obnoxious signature scrawled across two pages confirmed his suspicions.

And another glance at the pages upon pages of hero analysis made him laugh. Izuku Midoriya was far more interesting than he first thought. Such detail and precision...

Mere seconds and the boy was gone. All Might wouldn't be finding him anytime soon.

* * *

Inko was worried.

She was always worried, really, but she was truly starting to panic once her son hadn't come home.

She'd seen the news, and dopped the pan she was holding, and only the frightfully loud clatter of the metal on the floor had jerked her out of her fear.

Because her child had rushed forward and tried to save his bully.

It was so brave of him, and she was proud of him for doing the right thing. But she was so, so worried because it was so stupid and he could have died and-

and it was all to save the boy that bullied him.

She knew all about it, and she hated it. But she couldn't do anything about it.

She'd tried to get Izuku to talk, but her son refused to comment on his friendships, with the counterproductive intention of not worrying her.

She'd tried calling Bakugo's mother, and the woman was always horrified and furious with her son, but it made no difference. She'd tried calling the school, but there had been no reports of bulling.

She couldn't help but feel that she'd failed her son...

But he'd always come home as soon as possible. He'd always smile and offer to help with whatever she was doing, and she'd always refuse.

And now... She checked the clock again, fiddling nervously with her sleeves.

It had been two hours... Two hours since the incident with the sludge villain had ended, and he should have been home long ago.

Long, long ago.

Glancing at the clock, Inko decided that she'd wait ten more minutes before calling the police. She didn't know why Izuku wasn't home yet, but nothing sat well with her when she thought about it.

Even as she stared at the clock as if it could somehow magically bring her son home, she knew. She knew, deep down, that it had been too long, that Izuku wouldn't do this.

Whatever the reason was, her son wasn't coming home.

* * *

All Might wasn't worried at first. It had taken him a while to escape the reporters and he didn't have any idea where the young boy was. It was only natural that it'd take him a while to actually locate Midoriya.

Then he slowly began to panic. Just a small flicker of uneasiness at first, nothing he couldn't brush away.

It would be fine! He'd find the boy soon, he was sure!

 _"Can someone without a quirk be like you?"_

The boy had a dream, he wouldn't just give up! The boy could still be a hero, if only All Might could find him.

 _The boy had looked so defeated... But it was really for the best._

The uneasiness burst into panic and soon he was racing almost frantically through the maze of streets.

He couldn't say what was making him worry so much, not really. Perhaps the boy wouldn't be here anyway, perhaps All Might had just missed his chance for the day. Everything would be just-

A sudden movement caught his eye. A slight breeze had moved a sheet of paper, making it rustle loudly in the otherwise silent street. The sun was setting, painting the sky an eerie red, and the movement of the paper cast long, flickering shadows.

His heart sank as he picked it up. The edges of the paper were singed, as though the book the sheet had come from had been burned.

 _No..._

It was a little too similar to the book he'd signed earlier. Suddenly his panic felt justified, because further along the steet, another piece of paper was caught under a rock.

His hands shook as he grabbed the second page. It was also burned.

 _It isn't... I'm sure it's-_

He flipped the two pages over and could only gaze in horror at what he saw. His own fractured signature stared straight back at him.

This... This wasn't good.


	2. Chapter 2

Midoriya Izuku was classed as missing.

Midoriya Izuku was classed as missing as Katsuki Bakugo was telling himself that he didn't care.

He hadn't been the nerd's friend for years. He shouldn't matter. He didn't matter. He was just a weak, snivelling _Deku_.

So why did his gut twist with guilt and something that was almost like worry every time the missing boy was so much as mentioned.

 _"Your eyes... They looked like you were calling for help."_

Deku had been ridiculous. As if he would call for help. If that stupid Deku had known anything about him, he'd have know this: he didn't need help. He didn't need saving. The sooner the stupid Deku got it though his head, the better.

So why did he feel so guilty? None of this was his fault. If Deku couldn't take a few insults, well, that was nothing to do with him.

 _"If you want a quirk so badly, why don't you take a swan dive of the roof? Maybe you'll be reborn with a quirk in the next life!"_

It... It wasn't his problem!

But... But the case of Izuku Midoriya was a big mystery. It was unclear as to whether or not it was a kidnapping, him running away, or... or a suicide.

Either way, Bakugo didn't like it one little bit.

* * *

To say Izuku was surprised when he woke up would be an understatement. The first thing he became aware of was that he was lying on something soft... a little too uncomfortable to be a bed, but too cushioned to be the floor. It took him a moment that he had been laid on a sofa.

But it wasn't the sofa he had at home. That had springs prodding him in the back every time he so much as moved. This was far too comfy. This was strange and unfamilair and _wrong_.

Then, in the brief moment it took for him to notice that he was on a sofa, he realised there was a dull, pounding ache in the back of his head.

He struggled to remember anything that could possibly explain where he was... But all he came up with was his walking home, a flash of black and then nothing.

The smell was unfamiliar too. It took him a while to recognise the bitter stench as alcohol, and the sharp odour dragged up hazy memories of a tall man and the arcid tang of smoke.

Finally, beginging to panic slightly at not having a clue where he was, Izuku wrenched his eyes open, wincing as the sudden light made his head throb.

What had happened to him?

Peering around, he could only gape as he stared around a cozy bar, of all places. He didn't have a clue where he was, never having seen the place before in his life, and he certainly didn't have any bright ideas on how he'd ended up here.

"Ah, Izuku, you're awake." A pleasantly surpised voice said, and Izuku whirled around to stare at what had to be the strangest man he'd ever seen, with his features covered in what appeared to be flickering, black mist, with a pair of yellow eyes glinting merrily at him.

"How do you know my name?" To Izuku's surprise, his own voice didn't sound suspicious, only mildly curious.

"Hmm... You see, Izuku, there's quite a long story behind that." The man said with a tired sigh. "I'm Kurogiri. I work as a bartender here. Would you like some water? It may help with your head."

"I..." Izuku winced as his head gave another particularly painful throb. He could hardly think properly, he had too many questions and his head just _hurt_. "Okay, thank you."

The water was cool, and his hands trembled as they closed around the glass. Thankfully, with each sip the ache in his head faded slightly.

"Kurogiri," He asked carefully. "How did you know about my head?"

"Ah," The bartender laughed sheepishly. "That too is a long story. I'm sorry to say that your wound is entirely my fault."

His fault... The lack of memory. An unrecognizable place.

Izuku's worst suspicions were instantly confirmed. His stomach clenched and suddenly he felt like throwing up the water he'd just guzzled.

He was very, very aware that his back was to the only exit. He was very, very aware that the man almost definitely had a quirk and some form of combat training.

He was also painfully reminded that he was just a weak, quirkless Deku. He didn't stand a chance.

Kurogiri seemed to notice his tension, because the man shook his head.

"Honestly, Izuku, we're not going to kill you. If we wanted you dead, it would have been easy enough to finish you off while you were unconscious."

But Izuku only thought of Bakugo's cruel smirk and of narrowed red eyes and of the taunts of _'useless'._

 _There are some things worse than death._

Instead, he didn't speak instead studied the bar, looking for any clues as to what Kurogiri's quirk was.

He caught sight of something like dust, swept neatly into one corner. From years of practice, his mind scanned the room for any irregularities that could explain the pile of dust, and his eyes caught on the odd number of chairs.

Dust. Chairs.

Now that he thought about it, the dust looked suspiciously like wood grains. That could only mean...

Izuku glanced back at Kurogiri. He could destroy things, then?

He froze and stared at the man in horror. Either Kurogiri was capable of horrible things, or someone who had been in this bar (probably recently) was.

A laugh jolted him out of his thoughts. Kurogiri was laughing, his yellow eyes crinkled happily and glinting with mirth.

"You really are good, if you pieced all of that together so quickly. Of course, I already had some idea, as I've seen your notebook. Most impressive, Izuku."

Despite how wrong the entire situation was, Izuku couldn't help the sudden, small, happy glow that blossomed in his chest at that. _No one_ had ever praised him for his quirk analysis before.

Suddenly, there was a rapid sound of footsteps, sounding remarkably like rolling thunder. A young man with glaring red eyes stormed into the room, sitting heavily at one of the bar stools.

Meanwhile, Izuku tensed to run. Something about this man was wrong. Something about this man spoke of power. Something about this man just screamed 'villain'.

He had to get away. This was bad. Very bad. If he could just-

"Oi, Kurogiri! Who's the little shit? The one that looks like he's about to shit himself." The man snapped, and his voice was almost hoarse, like he either screamed all the time or hadn't spoken in a while.

"Please, Tomura Shigaraki. Refrain from using such vulgar language-" Kurogiri stared, but was interrupted.

"I asked who he was, not for a lecture on language." The man now revealed to be Tomura Shigaraki snarled quietly, the menu he'd been folding into a paper airplane suddenly crumpled and disintegrated into an untidy pile of ash, the flakes settling like snow on the glossy counter.

So this Tomura guy was the one with the disintegrating quirk? That meant that Kurogiri's quirk was unaccounted for. So he was up against an unknown element, outnumbered, was still injured and had no clue where he was.

Izuku's heart sank as he realised how little his chances were at getting away were.

"That's Izuku Midoriya, the one sensei requested." Kurogiri said, politely ignoring the way Tomura's eyes lit up like a child that had just been given a new toy and the way Izuku was eying the only exit frantically, like a caged animal.

"Ah, so he's awake." The screen, the one Izuku had previously assumed to be broken due to the static it was displaying suddenly crackled with noise.

"Sensei!" Tomura cried out, delighted.

Kurogiri nodded. "He woke up a little while ago. I thought it would be best to give him something to ease his headache before we started explaining things."

"Ah. Thank you, Kurogiri." The man said approvingly. "Now, Izuku. I'm inclined to believe that you'd like an explanation."

Not trusting himself to speak, Izuku only nodded warily.

"We're villains. We know your name because we hacked our way into the list of government doucments of the lists of quirkless people."

Izuku had known they were villains. Everything about the shady place just screamed 'villain'. But if they had the resources and skill to break in to those kind of records, then they were far more dangerous than he first though.

"The security was laughable, really. But then again, I can see it from their way of looking at things. Why place high security on a list of _quirkless_ people?"

And Izuku's stomach tightened as he was painfully reminded of all the times he'd been bullied, attacked, _burned_ , all because he was quirkless.

"But I digress... Anyway, we took you because we needed help from someone who was not in posession of a quirk. At the time, however, we were not aware of your abilities."

"My abilities?" Izuku asked before he could stop himself.

"Yes. Your notebooks. They're very detailed. You're certainly talented." The screen crackled with static, but the man's voice was smooth.

Even though he was being complimented, Izuku couldn't help but feel uneasy. Something about this didn't sit well with him. It was just-

"So we'd like to offer you to join us. You'd like the chance to show off your abilities, right?"

 _Wrong!_

"W-what?" Izuku wondered if he'd misheard that. This was a dream. A really, really horrible dream. He'd wake up the next morning, and he'd go to school, and everyone would laugh at him. He'd get beaten black and blue protecting some kid that had run off long ago and everything would be _normal_.

"We could give you a quirk, if you really wanted. If you join us, Izuku, you could show the world that you're more than just quirkless. You could show them all that you're more than just Deku."

Give him a quirk? That was impossible. But neither of the other two looked surprised, so maybe...Just maybe...

"You saw how the heroes treated you because you did what they couldn't. Ridiculed, and you did more than they did in the face of danger. You could prove them all wrong, if you agree to join us."

It was tempting. This man was speaking all of his darkest thoughts. All of the times he'd wanted to give up, all of the times he'd hated...

He'd thought about all of this before. Proving them wrong. Seeing the looks of shock as he proved them all wrong.

"You're villains." His voice shook.

"You can't still want to be a hero. Everyone you've saved has run away. You've never been thanked. Face it, Izuku. You'll never be appreciated as a hero."

How did they know this? It wasn't written down anywhere, and Izuku sorely doubted that anyone here had a memory reading quirk. He could only conclude that they were guessing.

Well, it wasn't far from the truth.

It was tempting. He could leave _Deku_ behind. He could stay here, and not get killed by the villains with all the dangerous quirks.

He could watch as the heroes he'd so admired were forced to eat their words, and he could prove his worth here more than as a quirkless boy with dreams far above his station. Here there would be no limits.

But...

But he remembered what it was like to fear for his life as he gasped for air, knowing that he would only suffocate. He remembered what it was like to claw desperately, and get weaker with each attempt. He remembered what it was like to know that no hero was going to come and save him.

If he even indirectly made anyone suffer through that...

"No." He said, for the first time sounding confident.. He knew he wouldn't get away from this. He knew that he'd probably die here. But he had a choice, and for once, he could be brave.

It'd cost him, but after a life of always being pushed down, always being told he was pathetic, being able to say 'no' despite all of that meant something to him in that one moment.

"That truly is a pity." The man on the other side of the screen almost sounded genuinely sad.

Tomura burst in to laughter.

"But you're lucky, you know." The man continued.

Kruogiri sighed almost sadly.

Izuku suddenly felt cold.

"Because you'll be far from quirkless when we're done with you."


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Hi! This is just a quick note before the chapter, mostly just to clear up a few things. Firstly, I've seen 'Noumu' spelt so many different ways, and I've decided to just chose one and stick with it, so at least it should be consistent (apologies if it isn't).**

 **Secondly, this chapter was originally going to be one much, much longer chapter, so a few questions raised here won't be answered until the next chapter- sorry!**

 **And lastly, I'd just like to thank everyone for the support this story has received so far!**

 **And I don't own Boku no Hero Academia, and I hope you all enjoy the chapter! :)**

* * *

Katsuki Bakugo had almost managed to forget. It would be harder not to forget about how one day Deku just wasn't there if he weren't at UA.

It'd taken him a while, but eventually he'd managed to push the thought that Deku had dreamed of also attending UA, and he was able to walk forwards and leave the memories of the timid quirkless boy far, far behind him.

His dream had seemed so much closer, and it was like the path laid out before him had just become all that much clearer.

So it was easier to focus on everything else.

But somewhere, at the back of his mind, he still remembered a pair of scared green eyes, a watery smile, and worst of all, a hand offering to help him.

But forgetting was easier, ignoring it was easier. So he almost agressively ignored all thoughts of the absent quirkless boy.

He should have known that he wouldn't be quite so lucky. He should have known that it'd come back to bite him later. He should have remembered that Deku had a habit of turning up when he wasn't wanted.

* * *

Inko had lost weight.

If anyone were to compare her to the woman she'd been a mere ten months ago, they'd struggle to see the similarities at first.

She hadn't been able to stomach the thought of eating while worry ate her alive. Every waking moment was plauged with thoughts of her son, where he was now, dead or alive.

Her eyes were shadowed by dark rings. She didn't sleep much anymore. Because when she dreamed, all she could see was her son, her poor, poor son alone and terrified where no one would find him. Or he'd be dead, eyes closed and face pale.

She wasn't sure which would be worse: dead or alive.

Because Izuku would always come home. Always. So if he was alive, then she sorely doubted he was happy.

But the thought of her son, who had smiled and laughed and played heroes being driven to taking his own life, or being killed when no one would know made a heavy weight settle on her heart and her vision would blur with fresh tears.

And all she could do was wait. Wait for news of her son who hadn't come home.

* * *

Bakugo had a feeling that something was going to go wrong. He couldn't exactly pinpoint _why_ he had this feeling of inpending dread, but he knew by now to damn well trust it.

So he was alert when everything went to hell.

He wasn't exactly surprised when villains poured out of some form of portal. He'd known that _something_ was going to go wrong, he just didn't know _what_.

But the icy feeling of dread only got worse from there on out.

"Stay back." Their maybe-not-so-crappy teacher snapped, fixing his goggles into place. "Thirteen, protect the kids."

And then their teacher- Eraserhead- blurred into motion and Bakugo got a good look at the villains for the first time.

They looked like average thugs for the most part, aside from that creepy as hell guy covered in hands and that gigantic monsterous _thing_. Even from so far away Bakugo had a _bad_ feeling about it, not that he'd ever admit to it.

Seriously, that _thing_ had to have some _nasty_ quirk. It almost completely outshone the small figure standing next to it, but Bakugo hadn't missed the mop of green hair-

Wait. Mop of green hair?

The mystery of Izuku's disappearance had been solved, it seemed.

His heart stopped.

"What the actual fuck?" He choked out, staring in complete horror at the hunched form of Deku as he stood there with villains. He felt like he'd been punched in the gut. The quirkless boy hadn't so much as glanced in his direction yet.

He got a few sympathetic looks from his classmates. They assumed that he was scared.

Then he was mad, no _furious_. He'd seen how worried Inko was, how the woman had become so thin. He had been almost worried about the damn useless nerd!

And all this time he'd been clowning around with villains.

He almost felt betrayed, which made no sense, because for there to be betrayal, there must have first been trust.

And he didn't even care about the shitty hero nerd at all, so really, all of this was irrational.

"Oi, Deku! What the fuck?" He screamed, eyes still wide with disbelief and his heart still hammering in his chest.

And the damn nerd didn't even glance at him.

The werid guy with the hands, however, doubled over in hysterical laughter. Bakugo was too far away to tell what was so funny, but it only made him feel uneasy.

He didn't have a clue what was going on and _that_ annoyed him to no end.

But he did know that he was going to enjoy beating answers out of the villains and Deku.

* * *

Noumu's head felt like it was full of static. There was a constant dull buzz of pain and fear, and more often than not, he couldn't muster the energy to think through it.

So more often than not, his thoughts reamined lost in a sea of static and hurt, and he was never quite sure what he was meant to do.

It often took a sharp command from the only person he was meant to take orders from- Tomura- to jolt him in to action. Once he knew what he was meant to do, it was so much easier to focus and so much easier to think.

Of course, he could take orders from someone that wasn't Tomura, but that was only really if Tomura wasn't there.

Occasionally, and never often, he could break through the static on his own, and then he'd just feel sick and scared and _wrong_.

He remembered a time when the static was worse, so bad that he could barely live with it all. He remembered even less about a time when there was no static at all, although he struggled to imagine exactly what a life of clarity would be like.

He remembered words more than people, voices more than faces. He remembered 'Deku' and 'quirkless' and 'sorry'. He couldn't attach any relevance to the words, but he knew them, and sometimes, when he could fight his way through the static, that counted for something.

There were a few memories he could recall clearly, if only because of the fear and pain and panic they contained gave them a razor sharp clarity.

 _He was still, frozen in place. The static was already there, but it wasn't quite so bad yet. His body ached with pain._

 _He remembered that he had to get out. He had to escape. He had to get back home._

 _He remembered a power- and he remembered how strange it was- the sensation of a force that felt like fire underneath his skin, before he was thrashing and fighting, the ealier stillness shattered._

 _Then he remembered more pain and utter, crushing defeat._

 _"You're turning out to be quite troublesome, little Noumu."_

There was another memory, but Noumu didn't like to dwell on it for too long because he was fairly sure that he wasn't meant to hear the few words his brain retained, and that memory was peppered with the same static that plauged him later.

 _"We can't mess him up too badly. That'll just ruin Hyperfocus."_

 _"But we can't let him think for himself. Or if he suddenly recovers or adapts. You saw what-"_

 _"Relax, both of you. I think we can find a way to work around it."_

He knew certain responses by emotion too. If he wasn't meant to respond, if he wasn't meant to do something, that meant pain and fear and his eyes would burn ever so slightly afterwards.

The static would be worse then, too.

So when he heard 'Deku' being screamed at him, he didn't react, because his head throbbed with static and it wasn't Tomura talking so he wasn't meant to respond.

But whatever was said, whatever it meant, Tomura found it funny. The pale-haired man had collapsed in hysterical giggles.

"One of Noumu's friends is here! How perfect!" Tomura had wheezed out between his laughter.

And Noumu, as always, didn't respond, because he was already lost in the static inside his head.

* * *

All Might was furious. Villains had attacked _his_ students, and if what he heard was correct, it was all for the sole purpose of drawing him out.

Of all the cowardly moves he despised, attacking children had to be the worst.

So he wasn't smiling as he stormed into the USJ. He was snarling, ready to give the villains what they so dearly deserved.

He was sickened by what he'd seen. His fellow teachers lay defeated, his students were scattered across the building, faced with enemies they had yet to learn how to deal with.

And then he saw Midoriya Izuku, and that was a blow to his heart.

Because he had failed. Because the signature left alone on the street had meant something after all, and he'd missed it.

Because even seeing so little of Izuku, All Might had seen the makings of a true hero in the boy, and knew that there was simply no way the boy would willingly join the villains. No, Izuku would never willingly fight alongside the villains that would attack innocent children.

Upon his arrival, the man with the hand covering his face chuckled. "Noumu." He spoke sharply, and Izuku, almost robotically, raised his head to stare at the man.

And his eyes... Izuku's eyes were dead, lifeless, uncomprehending. He stared blankly forwards, and there was no fire in his gaze.

 _"Even though I'm quirkless... Can I be a great hero, like you?"_

Back then, Izuku's eyes had given away his heart. When he asked All Might about his dream, the pro hero could see all the fear, the courage and the desperate, almost frantic hope. Now, it looked as though he was dead.

He stood there, frozen as he could stare at what had become of the boy who he had wanted for his successor .

"Noumu," the man with the crazed red eyes snapped. "Focus."

And just like that, Izuku's dead eyes focused on All Might.

If possible, Izuku's voice was worse than his eyes.

The boy spoke in a dull monotone, listing off the possible strengths, weaknesses and mechanics of All Might's quirk.

* * *

"Noumu. Focus." The sharp words broke through the static, cleaving through the confusion like a knife.

Focus. He knew what to do. Almost on instinct, a new power rushed to the surface. If the one he remembered using first felt like fire, this felt like ice.

It froze the static, a sudden cool rush of was refreshing in the first moments- because thinking and not hurting because of it was such a rare occurance.

Then the cold began to burn, because his focus was fixed in one place. He could finally see, he could finally think. But all of it was ruined, because he could only focus on one thing- all he could see were strengths and weaknesses and _answers_. And he couldn't help but want more, something more like he remembered before, something more like living.

So he hated and loved the clarity. He loved it because the static was gone, for one fleeting moment.

And he hated it because of the heavy, unbearable sadness it caused.

* * *

All Might had never seen Izuku talk about quirks before, but from what he'd heard from the boy's mother, his enthusiasm in the subject was beyond rival. He could imagine the rambling, the light in his eyes.

And so seeing this was just wrong.

"What did you do to him?" All Might demanded, staring at Izuku in horror.

The man covered in hands shrugged. "Noumu's fine. I don't see your problem with him." Then he grinned. "Other Noumu! You know what to do!"

And then the other beast dropped the mangled form of Eraserhead and staggered forwards.

The thing was a monster, it's hulking form covered in blood- his colleague's blood- and it's eyes were dead, much like Izuku's.

What had _happened_ to them both?

And just when All Might decided that the situation probably couldn't get any worse, one Katsuki Bakugo arrived, fuming and swearing, with a fretting Ochako Ururaka trailing behind him.

"Oi Deku, time for some answers."

 _Shit._


	4. Chapter 4

Uraraka decided that she hated Bakugo Katsuki pretty early on in her time at UA. He was quite frankly a bully, was cruel to everyone and had nothing but scorn in store for anyone that tried to get close to him.

So she completely loathed having to fight off villains alongside him, because she despised his rotten personality, and personally, although she'd never say it, wondered how he intended on being a hero.

While she wasn't normally judgemental, something about Bakugo rubbed her the wrong way. Maybe his own harsh demeanor clashed too dramatically with her more outgoing, cheerful attitude, or maybe it was just gut instinct.

Either way, she didn't like him, and she liked working with him even less.

That, perhaps, was due to the complete lack of teamwork. He blasted his way through the villains with almost terrifying efficency, while she struggled with each and every fight.

"You're useless, Round-face." Bakugo snapped. With one finaly explosion, he finished off the villain that Uraraka had been fighting with little success.

She turned around to face him, still struggling to catch her breath. She'd had little experience using her zero gravity in combat, and in the Conflagration Zone, she had next to nothing to work with, since she couldn't touch much of the debris due to the horrifyingly high temperatures. It was fustrating and exhausting, the flames doing little to help with the sheen of sweat coating her features.

So she was prepared to give Bakugo a piece of her mind- sharp words bubbling in her throat, only to be greeted with the sight of his back as he stormed away.

"Where are you going?" She cried, half out of shock and half out of fustration.

"I need answers." Bakugo answered shortly, not even turning to look at her. "Don't follow me."

"What answers?" She snapped, her patience gone. "What could be so important that you'd do something as suicidal as go straight where the villains are?"

"It's none of your business." Bakugo now whirled on her, looking furious. "And I could totally take on those villains, so don't call it suicidal, you weak extra!"

She scampered after him as he stormed away. "You really shouldn't- we should try and escape or help-"

"Shut up! And don't follow me!" He snarled, interrupting her.

She continued though. She wanted to be a hero! And that meant even though she didn't like Bakugo, or his personality, or his cruelty, that she wouldn't try and help him, if she thought it would save a classmate.

* * *

"Oi Deku, time for some answers!"

Nomou was jolted out of his focus by the loud yell. He had barely a second of clarity as he felt the ice-cold clarity fade away, and he felt a flash of shock and fear, as sudden and as painful as lightning.

Then the static was back, and everything faded out of focus.

One word, one thought, however, wormed its way into his mind, before the static closed in on him like a pair of thick, oppressive curtains.

 _Kacchan._

* * *

It had been much harder to tell from so far away, but the nerd had _changed_.

He was skinnier for one.

Bakugo had known Izuku for a long time, and while Izuku had always been a little scrawny, he never looked this bad. The Deku he remembered was scrawny and awkward and smiling and-

And this Deku's clothes were baggy, and his face had a gaunt, haunted look to it. Bakugo didn't like it one bit.

He was paler, too. His face was a chalky white, and his eyes looked so much darker, so much emptier because of it. He could hardly see the resemblance with the Izuku with the flushed face and the burning eyes that stood out so clearly in his memory.

 _"You looked like you were calling for help."_

And this Izuku with the dead eyes. Katsuki told himself that the nerd had always been so pathetic, but he felt cold at the thought that Izuku, with his blank eyes, couldn't even help himself.

"More interferences, how annoying." The creepy freak with the hands muttered. His hands clawed feverishly at his neck, and his red eyes narrowed in dislike.

"Nomou." Both Izuku and the massive bird turned to stare at him with the same blank eyes. "Not you." He said, gesturing dismissively at the large one. "You carry on."

Then he turned to Izuku. "You. Dispose of them."

And Izuku _blurred_ into motion.

And it wasn't only the force of the blow that Deku dealt to him that sent him reeling.

That speed... That strength... It wasn't natural. It _had_ to be a quirk- that was the only answer. But Deku was quirkless, Deku was weak and Deku never, ever had the courage to stand up for himself, never ever had the courage to actually fight back.

He could only stare in shock at the new blank Deku. This wasn't the same quirkless moron that used to follow him around. This wasn't the same Deku that had once, so long ago, been his friend. This wasn't the same Deku that had risked his life to save him.

And for once, Bakugo was stumped. All of the confusion, worry and guilt that had been gnawing at him since Izuku had disappeared caught up with him. He could only stare, struggling to process the feelings of revulsion and almost betrayal as he watched Deku slowly step towards Uraraka.

* * *

Nomou slowly walked forwards, looking down at the trembling girl. She had collapsed after just a few hits, from the power that felt like fire. Some part of him recalled that the quirk was some form of hardening, but that was hardly important at this point in time.

It was simple. All he had to do was defeat the two that Tomura ordered him to. It would be easy, all he needed to do was activate his quirk once more and aim for the head. Then they'd both collapse like puppets with their string cut, and it wouldn't matter to him at all.

He took another step forward. She was whimpering, and Nomu could tell that she was already exhausted, and her muscles were shaking with her efforts to move.

It would be easy.

Then he caught her eye. She was terrified. Her chocolate coloured eyes were wide with fear and brimming with tears. One glance told him how helpless she felt, how she was on the verge of accepting her fate.

And suddenly, memories came pouring through the static, and he froze.

 _He was clawing and struggling and squirming, but nothing was working. He was desperate, he was terrified, but none of it made any difference. He couldn't breathe and darkness was crawling across his vision._

 _He was going to die, and he knew it._

 _He was going to die, because he was powerless, because he was the least special and because he was just a useless Deku._

He slowly bought one hand to the side of his head in the hopes it would dull the trobbing pain as his memories tore their way through the static and the ringing words of Tomura's orders.

 _He remembered gasping for breath. He remembered disappointment._

 _He remembered having a choice, he remembered the temptation._

Unconsciously, he whispered the words ringing out clearly in his mind.

"No."

The girl stared at him, shock and confusion written all over her face, her eyes wide and still terrified. She was watching him warily, like he would attack her at many moment, but also with some small amount of curiousity.

Nomu wanted to say something- apologise, ask for help, anything- but another sudden burst of pain flared inside his skull as Tomura noticed his lack of movement and took action.

"Nomou!" Tomura howled, and the sheer rage and fustration contained in that one word was enough to make Nomou flinch.

Because, unbidden, more memories rose to the surface. He recognised the events this time, because they were about the time when the static first started and he had some hazy recollection of them at times when the static was slightly more forgiving.

 _"How do you like your new quirk Izuku?" It was Sensei that was talking, and he could hear rather than see the smirk in the man's voice._

 _He didn't respond. He was numb with disbeleif and at the same time, every single part of him throbbed with pain._

 _He couldn't have a quirk, it was impossible._

 _He was useless, quirkless. He couldn't have a quirk._

 _Sensei sighed, sounding more bored than disappointed. "Forced quirk activation." He said simply, and he bit down on his tongue to stop a scream at the sudden feeling of fire coursing through his arms. It hurt worse in some places than others, but he stared down at his hands in shock._

 _They were rough and a rough, smoky grey._

 _"It's a variant of a hardening quirk. There are plenty of them around." Sensei said idly, while he could only stare in horror._

 _Wrong._

 _This wasn't meant to happen. He'd always wanted a quirk, he remembered, he had always dreamed of this, but it was all wrong. It was like someone had taken his dream through a mirror and distorted it, and he was left wallowing in the horror of it all._

 _But stronger than the wrongness was the hatred that had settled firmly in his mind. The villains were evil, they were the cause of all of this and he_ hated _them._

 _He had to escape._

 _He looked down at his hands, so wrong and so deformed, and didn't need to look at his arms to know that the dark splotches would be there too. This was wrong, this was terrible and he hated it._

 _But he could use it._

 _He could escape._

With some effort, Nomou dragged himself away from the memories. He already knew how this would end. Whatever he'd tried, it had failed, and the dark tendrils of fear were still wrapped firmly around his brain whenever he thought about the consequences of his attempted escape.

Unfortunately, the other Nomou had taken Tomura's screech as an order and had moved to crush the girl.

Nomou wasn't sure why he did it. His body just moved. He didn't have any reason to save the girl- he had been trying to kill her mere moments before- and he still had his orders to kill both her and the boy.

But instead he moved on reflex, and shoved her out of the way, just as the other Nomu's fist slammed into the ground where she had been moments before.

The rest was a blur.

He was aware of Tomura screaming and an awful, agonising pain in his head. He was aware of the static closing in on him and the last of the clarity he'd once longed for be covered and stolen away.

He was aware of other voices, both of them failing to spark any recognition, he was aware of Kurogiri talking, the other Nomu screaming.

He was aware of falling and then he was aware of nothing more.

#

All Might knew he had failed the instant the man with the Warp Gate quirk reappeared. He only needed to hear the word 'reinforcements' to know that they were going to bolt.

He was winning. It was a long, drawn out fight and although the huge monster hadn't shown any visible signs of weakness, he'd felt its punches grow weaker and weaker.

If he'd been late because he'd overused his quirk... He didn't want to think on what would happen.

But instead he'd been talking to Inko Midoriya and apologising again. He blamed himself for Izuku's disappearance, thinking that maybe, just maybe his own harsh words had driven the boy to... to whatever had happened.

And Inko hadn't been coping well. Now All Might worried for her, because she looked frailer and thinner and sicker every time he saw her. She needed someone to vent to, being so very lonely without her son, and he was more than happy to listen, if it would help.

So he desperately wanted to somehow save Izuku from the grip of the villains, because he still saw the boy with the heart of a hero, the boy with Nana's smile, the boy he'd so badly wanted as his successor. He wanted to save Izuku so he could somehow fix what he'd felt he caused.

But the massive monster wouldn't let him get close. It was infuriating.

He could just hear little snippets of conversation as he traded blows with one of the toughest opponents he'd ever faced.

"Kurogiri, Nomou's being defective. _Again_."

"That's... troubling. I realise that we had no choice but to leave him like this due to his analysis skills... But for him to rebel so soon..."

The monster let out a deafening screech as All Might punched it square on the jaw, and he felt the beast _shudder_ from the impact.

"The reinforcements will be here soon. We must leave."

"I..." Tomura glared at Izuku. "Fine."

The monster's attacks were getting wilder now. It's desperation showed in its movements.

"Defective Nomou! Get over here." Tomura bellowed, and All Might would later hear from Uraraka that Izuku flinched at the voice.

One last punch and the Noumu he was fighting collapsed, no longer having the strenth to move.

Then the reinforcements arrived. The villains panicked. And All Might lost Izuku.

Izuku was stuck on the back of the head, and fell limply into the portal. Tomura gave them one last venomous look, dark eyes promising pain and death and suffering.

Bakugo was screaming, apparently recovering from his shock. "Deku!"

Uraraka had finally dissolved into tears.

And Izuku was gone.

Cementos sheilded him from the two students, and All Might felt his stength slip away from him. He sank to his knees, gasping for breath. He thought of Izuku's dead eyes, so lifeless and dead and horrible, compared with the fire he'd seen when the boy rushed forwards to save young Bakugo. He thought of Inko's eyes, welling with a horrible, anguished sadness.

And allowed himself to feel complete and utter defeat.


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Hi! Just a quick note before the chapter. This one was getting a little (very) long, so I cut it short, sorry! All it really means is that some of the questions raised in the previous chapters won't be answered for a little while, but it can't really be helped. :D**

* * *

Uraraka was nervous. Her hands trembled and she absently fiddled with her sleeves in an effort to compose herself.

Ever since USJ had been attack, she'd had awful nightmares. Of screaming, of laughter and of sad, lost green eyes. Thankfully a little make-up hid the bags under her eyes, and if anyone noticed they didn't comment on it. Being a student at UA was so hectic and stressful that her days were often crammed with work and training, and all of that pushed everything else to the back of her mind.

It was when she was alone and able to unwind that the memories came back to haunt her. The smell of smoke, the violently red flames of the Conflagration Zone, the echoing laughter of the blue-haired man, and the boy with the dead eyes that had saved her. The almost familar boy with the dead eyes that had, for a moment, looked alive.

But that wasn't the reason for her current fear. She had been called to the staff room, and she couldn't think of any reasons why. She hadn't done anything wrong- really. She'd tried too hard to get into UA to blow her chance by messing up.

Her fear only hightened when she saw Bakugo standing outside, glaring at the door with his angry red eyes.

He'd been, if possible, even angrier since the villain attack. No one had linked it to the way he'd screamed at one of the villains at the start of the invasion. No one except Uraraka, but she hadn't said anything to him, not yet.

Everyone had their own demons to deal with after the incident.

She was snapped out of her musings by the door opening. She blinked at All Might as he beckoned them both in.

He was smiling, as always, but it seemed forced. If she squinted, she could see the dark circles under his eyes.

 _Everyone_ had their demons to deal with. Even the teachers.

"Thank you both for coming on such short notice. Would either of you like some tea?" The Number One hero sounded unusually solemn as he gestured to a recently boiled kettle that sat on a table in the corner of the room.

Bakugo merely grunted, which All Might took as a no. Uraraka politely accepted, figuring that a drink would probably calm her nerves.

"How are you both coping after the attack?" All Might asked, nursing his own cup of tea.

Bakugo answered first, naturally. "Completely fine."

Uraraka blew on her tea, hoping to stall. When the silence only streched onwards, she sighed. "I think I'll be okay." She admited in a small voice.

All Might's tone was soft, sympathetic as he responded. "Aizawa is looking in to arranging some appointments with the school counsellor for the entirety of your class to help you all cope." He informed them gently.

Uraraka managed a weak smile. That _did_ sound good.

"You didn't call us here about that, did you?" Bakugo interrupted, and to Uraraka, his voice sounded harsher than usual.

"No," All Might sighed, and suddenly all of Uraraka's fear rushed back. "I didn't."

Uraraka's hands tightened around her cup.

"Both of you saw the green-haired boy that was with the villains." All Might began, and Uraraka almost flinched at the mention. She wondered how the boy's eyes had become so dead, if he'd always been that way.

"Of course I did. It was _Deku_." Bakugo muttered, as if that explained everything.

All Might ignored him, but Uraraka noticed the pro hero's frown at the name 'deku'. "The boy's name was Izuku Midoriya."

And this time, Uraraka did flinch. That was why he looked familar. She'd seen his smiling face on the missing posters. They'd been everywhere.

The boy with the dead eyes- Izuku Midoriya- was the missing quirkless boy.

Uraraka felt sick. Even in the picture, his eyes had been filled with emotion. He was smiling, he was _happy_. It was so difficult to reconcile the pale boy with the dead eyes with the grinning boy on the poster.

It was hard to reconcile the awkward smile with the tortured whisper of 'no'.

"I want to ask you what you saw. I was fighting the one they called Nomu, so I didn't see everything that happened. Although at the end, the one with the hand on his face- I think the Warp Gate called him Tomura? Anyway, he was yelling because he was mad." All Might explained. "Do either of you know what happened?"

Bakugo was silent and his normally blazing red eyes were distant as he was clearly remembering something.

"He saved me." Uraraka spoke softly, but in the silence that had followed, she may as well have screamed. All Might's face contorted with shock, and for a moment, Uraraka saw guilt, anger and something tortured in his eyes before he composed himself.

"What do you mean?" All Might's voice was stiff, as though he was trying to stop his emotions from creeping into his tone.

"He was going to attack me, or finish me off. Then he just froze." Uraraka stared at her own pale reflection. "He whispered something, too. He said 'no' and that was when the guy with all the hands started screaming."

She shuddered seeing the smile on the poster and the terrified, _alive_ eyes of Izuku Midoriya at the same time. "Then the big monster moved to attack me, but Izuku pushed me out of the way."

She tried not to think of the way he was trembling. From fear, nerves or effort, it had been impossible to tell.

She didn't need to say anything else. Bakugo was shaking slightly, although his expression was unreadable.

All Might was silent for a long time. Then he sighed heavily, and not for the first time, Uraraka wondered what the strain of being Number One was like. Being the one everyone looked up to. Being the one villains always targeted. Being the one everyone looked to for answers.

She wondered how he knew Izuku Midoriya, how Bakugo knew Izuku Midoriya. They both seem so invested in all of this.

"Both of you, I'm going to have to ask you to keep quiet about seeing young Midoriya there." All Might said finally. "He... He isn't there willingly, as far as we can tell. In fact-" All Might stopped speaking very arubtly, like he'd been about to let something slip.

Bakugo caught on to this too. "What? What do you think happened to Deku?" He sounded frantic, almost desperate, and Uraraka thought that she saw the glimmer of tears in his eyes.

All Might paused, looking rather like a deer caught in headlights. Then he sighed, sounding far too exhausted, far too weary. "I can't tell you. Not only is it incredibly upsetting, but it's also highly classified. Thank you both for coming here on such short notice." It was a clear dismissal, and both Uraraka and Bakugo rose walking out of the office in silence.

Bakugo was glaring at the ground, and didn't look back.

Uraraka glanced over her shoulder, and her heart ached to see All Might staring at his hands like a lost man.

The door clicked shut with an awful finality.

But Uraraka had a question. Actually, she had several, because Izuku Midoriya had saved her, despite all the horrible things she could imagine happening to him, despite his dead eyes.

He was quirkless. Or he had been quirkless. He'd actaully had several quirks when he'd fought her- the ever so slightly unnatural speed, the hardening quirk... Did all of this have anything to do with his dead eyes?

But he had been quirkless. Even though he was smiling in the picture, he'd been awkward and shy, and one word kept tugging at her mind. Now that she thought about it, the picture she had been so clearly seeing in her mind had been of a lonely, slightly scared boy.

"Bakugo?" She asked, not really sure where she was going with this.

He whirled around to glare at her, and his expression made everything click.

Deku meant useless. Izuku had been quirkless. Bakugo was cruel, Bakugo never had anything kind to say to anyone, Bakugo was a bully. And Bakugo clearly knew Izuku.

And she knew well enough how quirkless people were treated.

"Why did you call Midoriya 'Deku'?"

His lack of an answer told her more than enough.

And whether she liked it or not, Uraraka knew she would have so many more aspects to her nightmares about the boy that had saved her.

* * *

"I'm sorry." All Might said again, feeling as every bit as pathetic as he sounded.

"H-he was with the villains?" Inko asked softly, her voice robbed of any volume by her disbelief. She was trembling, her fists were clenched, but she hadn't started crying yet, no matter how badly she wanted to collapse into tears as the mere thought of what Toshinori had just told her.

 _"Hey Mum! I-I can be a cool hero too, right? J-Just like All Might!"_

"He... Yes." Toshinori Yagi said uncomfortably.

Inko narrowed her eyes. "You're hiding something." She accused, suddenly angry. Her son was with villains. She didn't know why, but Toshinori did. She was certain of it.

"The details will be upsetting." Toshinori warned. One look at his face, the dark rings under his eyes, promised a dark, ugly truth.

But...

"I'm his mother." Inko said firmly. "I have a right to know what happened to him."

"I..." Toshinori swallowed. "There's no easy way to say this, I'm afaid. We have reason to believe he was experimented on. He demonstrated multiple quirks."

 _Experimented on?_

 _Izuku?_

And that broke whatever brave face Inko had. She openly broke into sobs, and only later would she realise that she had collapsed on to her knees, because she didn't have the strength to hold herself up anymore.

 _"He saves everyone with a smile! I want to be like that."_

"What do you mean experimented on him? What did they do?" She wailed, her entire body shuddering with the force of her sobs.

"From what we can tell from the information we got from the other Nomu, he was given a quirk. Multiple quirks. But he... He was like a puppet."

And Toshinori didn't know how to comfort the crying woman. All he could do was get her a glass of water and listen to her cry.

Finally, after she'd run out of tears, she spoke in a small, broken voice.

"He wanted to be a hero more than anything else, you know?"

 _"I'm sorry, Izuku."_


	6. Chapter 6

"It happened again?" Sensei's voice was soft, dangerous.

Nomou, from where he stood, shivered in fear.

It was instinctive fear. Not the kind that would be natural, not the animal kind of fear. No, Nomou knew, deep down that this fear was _learned_.

Nomou knew by now to associate some particular tones with fear, with pain and that odd little feeling of hatred.

But the static had been worse when he'd got back. Tomura had been angry, and he had raged.

Nomou's entire head ached with the memory of Tomura's screams. Each and every one of Tomura's cruel words had sliced straight through the static until Nomou could barely think clearly enough to even register the voice.

Even later, the static was still riddled with the occasional memory of a voice dripping in hatred and malice and dark, poisonous words.

Dimly, Nomou was aware that he hurt. Well, that he was hurt outside the constant throbbing of his head. Tomura had lashed out, and Nomou's arm burned with pain at every movement, but that was really the least of his concerns.

He knew that Kurogiri had brought him here to be Fixed. He knew that once he was Fixed, the static would come back worse than ever.

"This isn't the first time you've done this, Nomou." Sensei continued, and Nomou tried not to flinch. He didn't like that tone. Not at all.

"I do wonder though... How many times do you remember defying us, Nomou?" Sensei asked, and Nomou froze.

"Twice." Nomou responded dully. He already knew that not answering when Sensei sounded like that would only result in more pain.

"That's interesting, really." Sensei continued. "Because this most recent time marks the sixth time you've been, as Tomura would say, defective."

This was news to Nomou.

"And I want to know why. I have a theory, but I don't know for sure." Sensei continued. Nomou just stared blankly forwards, idly wondering what any of this had to do with being fixed.

"So why? Why, Nomou, did you save that girl? Why didn't you kill them like you were told to?" Sensei sounded calm. He sounded almost gentle, reassuring, but Nomou knew better.

All Sensei was associated with was pain and fear.

And so he answered honestly. "I remembered dying. I was helpless. I couldn't kill someone suffering the same fear."

"Oh?" And this time Sensei sounded amused. "You really were a hero to the very end, Nomou. I think if you remembered who you were, you'd be proud."

"Who I was?" Nomou echoed blankly.

"It's not important." Sensei chuckled. "I know why you're acting up now, and it's impossible to fix forever. We had to leave you able to think, otherwise you'd just be a waste. Too bad it proved to be so troublesome."

"You're probably wondering why I've bothered to tell you all of this." Sensei continued.

Nomou hadn't wondered. Nomou was wondering if he could somehow run away.

"Because you won't remember anyway."

And Nomou was frozen by some invisible force- one of Sensei's quirks- and he closed his eyes. There wasn't any point in fighting. He'd remembered that from his previous defiance.

A second later, he crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut, and Sensei sighed in the sudden silence.

"Really now, if only he'd just agreed to join us. It would have saved me a headache."

* * *

Nomou stared at nothing while Kurogiri and Sensei talked. He was less a part of the conversation and more a part of the background.

Idly, he heard a few words. Things like 'post traumatic stress disorder' and 'adapting' and 'memory' and 'reset'. But his mind was brimming with static, like nothing had ever been any different, and so none of the words mattered.

They weren't commands, therefore they were irrelevant. He wasn't meant to listen if they meant nothing, and that was that.

So he just stared forwards and waited for orders as Sensei told Kurogiri all the answers that the heroes, so far away, all wanted to hear.

* * *

"Nomou, analyse the quirks on the screen." Tomura barked. Obediently, Nomou rose to study the screen, and a few moments later, a pencil could be heard scratching frantically against the notepad he had been given.

"The UA sports festival?" Kurogiri inquired quietly.

"Yeah." Tomura shrugged. "Beats the news."

"You really don't like the Hero Killer?" Kurogiri asked, bustling around behind the bar, even though there was really no need to.

"He pisses me off." Tomura grunted, raising his hand to scratch his neck. "But he could be useful, I suppose..."

"Would you like me to collect him?"

"Yes."

* * *

Bakugo was distracted. That was the only excuse he had for his poor performance.

 _"Why did you call Midoriya 'Deku'?"_

The stupid girl with the weak as hell quirk had been acting almost straight up sanctimonious, and it sickened him.

It was none of her damn business! She didn't even know the stupid nerd and she had taken to glaring at him.

Like it would change anything now.

Izuku wasn't Deku anymore, not really. Bakugo had seen the quirks that Izuku had used and it was impossible, or at least, it should have been impossible.

But it wasn't, was it?

And the stupid gravity girl thought she knew everything. He almost hoped that he'd end up fighting her, just so he could show her how weak she really was.

 _Just like you did with Deku_?

See, distracted! That was the only reason he was performing so badly against the girl who could create things.

She was actually doing rather well, although he'd never admit it. She'd created several shields and barracades before settling on making some nice, long range weapons that meant that he couldn't get close.

That was all about to change.

With his usual ruthless attitude, he blasted through the last of the barricades. From there on out, it was dodging her attacks, which his explosions allowed him to do with little trouble, before he roughly barreled into her, causing her to yelp in surprise, and she was launched firmly out of bounds.

It was a complete turnaround, the judges announced. He'd been losing just moments before, and he'd suddenly turned the tables. It wasn't kind or graceful, but it was something quite astonishing.

He would advance to the next round. He hadn't really been worried. In fact, he loathed that it'd got to the point where his victory was seen as a _surprise_. He had to stop being so distracted!

 _"You're the greatest, Kacchan!"_

But that was a lot easier said than done, especially when he caught Uraraka glaring at him again. Well, nothing had anything to do with her, and she didn't know shit, so what did he care?

No, all that mattered was that he could reach Number One.

* * *

Stain had actually had a rather nice day. Well, nice wasn't exactly a good way to put it. Distantly, there would be some part of him that disliked killing, disliked the fights and disliked the taste and smell of blood.

But that small part of him was overridden by the need for justice and the overwhelming hatred for pro heroes.

That being said, he didn't enjoy killing, he didn't enjoy leaving bloodied and broken bodies of fakes behind, but he understood that it was necessary for a better world.

So his day had been _productive_ , not exactly nice.

Then of course, an invitation from the League of Villains had arrived, ruining his grimly pleased mood.

He was curious, but also catious. The League was, with little doubt, interesting, but there had been some rumours... Nasty rumours...

Still, he accepted. Partly due to the rumours- he wanted to know if they were true- and partly due to the slim chance that they had the same ideas about a few certain things...

Working alone was going to become risky sooner or later, and while he was fairly confident that he'd be okay...

It couldn't hurt to check.

He found himself in a bar. The smell of alcohol was slightly too noticable. It didn't sit well with Stain, but he didn't comment.

"You're the Hero Killer, huh?" A lazy voice called, and Stain turned to see a man with a hand covering his face. But Stain didn't miss the narrowed, calculating red eyes.

Once again, he didn't comment.

"You wanted to speak with me?"

* * *

"I can't stand people like you, you know?" Shinsou spat furiously, glaring at the Hero Course student in front of him.

The boy didn't reply, merely raised an eyebrow at him, clearly having heard about Shinsou's quirk.

"You've had everything handed to you on a silver platter." Shinsou sneered. "Your quirk is perfect for hero work, you've never had to worry about not being able to achieve your dream."

Shinsou shrugged, still glaring at the unmoving boy standing in front of him.

"I'll bet you've had everything you've ever wanted," Shinsou asked bitterly. "Haven't you, Endeavour's son?"

And Shouto Todoroki, still trembling with anger, _snapped_.

Within seconds, Shinsou was encased in a huge glacier made of ice, all pointed edges and cold, frigid beauty.

"Shinsou, can you move?" Midnight, their judge, asked.

The boy scowled. "No."

"Shouto Todoroki is the winner." She announced, but the crowd was shocked into silence. Todoroki would not be cheered for in his victory.

As Shouto marched forward stiffly, and began to melt the ice with a small burst of heat from his left side, he hissed quietly to Shinsou, so that no one else could hear.

 _"Your left side... It's very unsightly."_

His hand shook as he melted the ice.

 _"You're just a weapon... A way for me to surpass All Might."_

Endeavour's son sounded so bitter and so angry and so broken when he spoke.

"You don't know anything."

* * *

"It looks like we just couldn't agree on a fundamental level." Stain muttered. He'd frozen Kurogiri with his quirk easily enough, and now Tomura was pinned down, with one of Stain's blades at his neck.

"Any last words?" Stain asked. He hated killing, but these villains would involve innocents. These villains didn't want a better world, they just wanted a world without All Might.

"Yeah." Tomura grunted. Stain didn't miss the way he grinned, or the insane laugh that threatened to spill into his voice. "Nomou."

Stain had exactly one second to wonder if Tomura was just crazy or if it was a code word before a small, solid form barrelled into him.

There was a sudden flurry of blows, and already caught off guard, Stain couldn't react until he was aware of the sudden pain that came from a broken arm, and the other arm, blade still in hand, was pressed painfully against his back.

A mere moment later, he was choking as he was pinned against one of the bar's wall. Still reeling with disbelief, he stared into the eeriely focused eyes of Izuku Midoriya.

"Better, Nomou." Tomura praised.

Stain, in that moment, felt pure hatred. "Those... Rumours were true." He choked out. "You really were behind the disappearances."

Tomura, however, just shrugged. "That's not what you need to worry about."

Stain just glared. Kurogiri coughed as he regained movement, but merely bustled around behind the bar and didn't make any move to attack. And Nomou remained frozen in place, waiting for more orders.

"Now, Hero Killer, would you like to continue negotiating?"

* * *

Bakugo was finally fighting Uraraka.

He was finally fighting her, he was finally beating her, and she was still fighting back. She was still standing in front of him.

Just like De-

And it was pathetic, he told himself. She wouldn't win, it didn't matter.

"You don't know anything." He growled at her, glaring as she merely narrowed her eyes and prepared to rush forwards again. "You don't know anything so stop looking at me like that."

That finally provoked a response. She hissed at him, eyes full of such uncharismatic _hate_. "I know that you'd bully someone weaker than you. I know you'd bully someone just for being quirkless."

Bakugo responded by blasting her away with another explosion, and lost sight of her face, white with fury in the smoke.

"How can you call yourself a hero?" She screamed, and then the stones came raining down. For a mere moment, Bakugo froze.

 _"You'll be a great hero, Kacchan!"_

One of the sharp stones plummeted towards his face, and made a thin cut as he leapt away. The sudden stinging pain was enough to spur him into action.

Her plan didn't work. She collapsed in exhaustion afterwards and he was left standing.

He looked down at her limp form and tried not to see Deku. He looked down at her limp form and still felt empty, still felt guilty. He looked down at her limp form and let the blood drip down instead of tears.

 _"I want to be a hero!"_

"You don't know anything." He repeated softly, but the words sounded hollow, even to himself.


	7. Chapter 7

If Stain hadn't hated the League of Villains before he was forced to work with them, then he certainly hated them after he heard their plans.

He was against heroes. He was against those pretending to be heroes, those in it for the fame, the glory, the money.

But he was also against attacking civilians. He'd seen what the monsters could do, the brainless ones with their blank eyes. The heroes would be hard-pressed to fend them off. People would die. Innocent people would die.

It wasn't what he was fighting for. He wanted a more just society, not whatever twisted world the League had in mind.

"Oi, Hero Killer, the plan starts in fifteen minutes. You ready?" Tomura called lazily, not even turning to look at Stain. The villain's body guard, the one Stain recognised as Midoriya Izuku stared blankly at him, but Stain wasn't fooled. If he made the slightest wrong move, the boy would _react_.

He remembered idly that the boy had been quirkless. He certainly wasn't anymore. That had to be how they made the scarily strong monsters, the ones with the unseeing eyes and the terrifying strength.

He tried not dwell on that too much. He doubted that any of the creatures that had once been human could actually be _saved_. (Bitterly, he'd wonder where the heroes had been when those people had been taken.)

"I'm ready." Stain grunted in response.

"Good." Came Tomura's smug response."Because there has been a last minute change of plans."

Stain narrowed his eyes. "What changes?"

"We don't exactly trust you to play your part." Tomura started.

Stain nearly snorted. They were right not to trust him. He had absolutely no intention of-

"So Nomou here will be keeping you company. He'll... keep you in line." Tomura said proudly. Izuku blinked, but didn't say anything.

"Shigaraki Tomura, is that wise?" Kurogiri hissed.

"Sensei fixed him right? It should last for at least a few more months. And there'll be other Nomou around if things go wrong. It'll be fine." Tomura dismissed airiy.

Stain, meanwhile, was interested. Fixed? Last a few months?

Then he dismissed his curiousity. His only objective was to kill heroes and escape under the cover of the League's attack.

And if Izuku Midoriya tried to get in his way... Well, maybe death would be kinder than whatever tortured existance the boy with the dead eyes lived.

* * *

"Young Uraraka?"

The normally lively girl jumped, looking startled. All Might noticed, with some concern that she didn't look any better, despite the School Counsellor meeting with every student in 1-A.

"Are you alright? You've been staring at the wall for a few minutes now." All Might asked gently. He hadn't expected to run into any students during the lunch break- the halls he was in now were usually deserted.

"I'm fine." The student answered quickly. "Just haven't been sleeping well, that's all."

"Have the meetings not been helping?" Now All Might was concerned. Even though teaching was new for him, he still cared about all of his students. To see such obvious signs of stress and exhaustion in anyone would be horrifying enough, but for someone he was supposed to guide and teach...

"I guess." She mumbled. "It's just... Midoriya saved me, right? And he looked almost dead. And even in the missing poster, he looks scared..."

Then she laughed, almost bitterly. "I know it sounds weird, but I can't help but wonder if maybe he got into trouble for helping me."

 _"He wanted to be a hero more than anything else, you know?"_

"I think Midoriya always wanted to help people." All Might said quietly. "I dont' think he'd regret helping you."

"Huh? Did you know Midoriya, sensei?" The girl asked, then flushed. "Sorry! That was such a personal question- I'm really, really sorry!"

 _"Can someone like me, can someone without a quirk be a hero?"_

"I met him breifly, once." All Might admitted.

The rest of the conversation was short, and soon All Might found himself alone.

 _I met him breifly once._ He thought sadly. _And I failed to save him then. Then I failed to save him later._

 _And I call myself a hero? How pathetic._

* * *

Iida had expected many things when he finally found the Hero Killer. He'd expected to fight and gain the bittersweet vengance he sought after seeing his brother- the same brother who'd laughed with him, supported him, cared for him- broken and helpless in a hospital bed.

He'd expected, maybe, to die. That he'd die in a dark, lonely place painted with blood and the air filled with smoke from the burning city as monsters rampaged on the streets. He'd die knowing that he'd failed. Failed as a hero, and failed as a brother. He'd die knowing he'd done something, though, and that had been enough to make him search for the Hero Killer.

 _I will avenge you, Tensei._

What he didn't expect was for Stain to be already fighting someone. A hero, Native if Iida remembered correctly, was covered in his own blood and trying to crawl away, eyes full of a desperate, almost animal fear.

"Run," the hero rasped once he saw Iida. "They're both monsters. Get away." There was a clanging noise from behind the hero, and Iida could see the silver gleam of a blade in the dim moonlight.

The pro hero pulled himself to his feet and clutched the wall, and hurridly limped out of the alleyway without once looking back. He did, however call out. "Come on kid, seriously. You don't want to tangle in that. I'm too weak to force you to do anything, so please just leave it."

Then he continued walking. "I'll send for reinforcements. They destroyed my radio. Please don't get involved."

And so the hero left and Iida stood there, frozen in his indecision.

He knew he should help Native. He should get reinforcements, he should leave it to the pros. He should act in a manner that Tensei would be proud of.

But Tensei couldn't stop him or scold him or guide him, and it was all Stain's fault.

 _"Iida, take the name Ingenium. D-don't let i-it die."_

But Tensei had been wonderful and perfect and alive. But now...

 _"I-I love you, T-Tenya. I'm p-proud of you..."_

His brother was meant to watch him become a hero. His brother was meant to watch him and be proud of him and-

 _And the heart monitor suddenly made a loud, flat noise, as if to try and hide the fact that Tensei wasn't breathing anymore._

So Iida couldn't quite let go of the burning, bubbling hatred in his gut. The hatred that had his brother's pale face and the sound of the flat heart monitor.

In his moment of indecision, the fight had taken a time for the worse. The familiar green-haired boy was breathing heavily and had several cuts. Remarkably enough, however, all of the bloodied weapons used to injure him had been scattered behind him so the killer couldn't reach them. They lay like silver and crimson stars in the shadows, beautiful in a morbid way.

Finally, Iida sprung into action, his quirk boosting him until the walls blurred. He couldn't help the thrill of grim satisfaction that flooded him as he heard the Hero Killer hit the wall.

And then the confusion when almost instantly, taking advantage of the moment of the Hero Killer's weakness, the green haired boy rushed forwards and had Stain pinned by the throat.

Iida noticed the way that the boy's skin was a dark metallic colour, the moonlight turned it silver and cruel and deadly.

He must have blinked, watching in a moment of horror and indecision, because suddenly Stain had kicked out the boy's feet from underneath him, and the tables had turned.

The air was thick with the smell of blood, and if Iida wasn't so focused on trying to find a way to help- everything was happening so fast and it was so confusing and he couldn't find a way to attack Stain without also hurting the green-haired boy- but suddenly the boy stopped moving, like he was frozen in place.

Stain, without a moment to spare, slammed the boy into the unforgiving stone wall, and the boy crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut.

Then everything slowed down.

The boy lay unmoving on the floor, looking almost peaceful in a tide of blood and steel.

Stain raised a knife.

And Iida kicked it out of his hands. The clang of the cold steel hitting the concrete was completely drowned out by the blood ponding in his ears. For a moment, he met the eyes of the killer- they were cold and calculating and crazed.

"I don't have time for this." Stain growled. "Just let me kill him."

Iida just _glared_. He hoped that all his pain, all his anger, all his grief showed in his eyes, and he hoped the Hero Killer saw. He hoped the Hero Killer saw his defiance and he hoped that the man that had killed his brother knew that Ingenium wasn't dead- that Ingenium wanted revenge.

"I won't let you kill anyone else." Iida hissed. In that moment, he saw his brother's eyes, one moment so full of pride and love and sadness, and the next moment, he heard the final mournful noise of the heart monitor.

He wondered if the boy lying limply behind him had a family. A mother to cry over him. A brother to miss him. Friends to pray for him.

He wondered how many would die, like Tensei, if the Hero Killer wasn't stopped. And he knew there and then that he would be happy to die protecting those people. Dying so that someone else may live.

Because that was what a hero did. Because that was worthy of the name Ingenium. Because then he could join his brother in the afterlife, and Tensei would be proud of him again.

"You would be a good hero." The Killer mused, sounding almost mournful. "But you're protecting the wrong person. That Nomou probably can't be saved. It isn't human anymore."

Before Iida could say anything, the Hero Killer's eyes went wide with shock. He wasn't looking at Iida. No, he was looking past him.

The reinforcements had arrived.

Stain growled, an angry, guttural noise, before turning and fleeing, ducking around a corner even as the Pros gave chase.

But Iida just felt exhausted. He collapsed to his knees in front of the boy, the one he'd saved, the one who couldn't be saved.

Even as the ambulances arrived and the police started to tape off the area, Iida didn't move for a while, not until the medics gently asked if he could move, or did they need to lift him on a stretcher.

Then he just shook his head and let them heard him into an ambulance. Even as the ambulance left in a blaze of sirens, Iida thought of the alleyway.

He thought of the darkness and the blood and how, for a moment, he'd actually felt like a hero, and not just a foolish, hurting boy who wanted his brother back.

 _"I'm p-proud of you..."_


	8. Chapter 8

All Might had pulled as many strings as he could, and for that sole reason alone, Midoriya Izuku hadn't recieved the same imprisonment as the other Noumu. Instead, he was in a heavily guarded hospital room.

Because Izuku had been a villain, through choice or not, because Izuku wasn't Izuku anymore. But Izuku was still a teenager. Because Izuku had been through hell, and there was a chance, if the medical scans were any indication...

There was a chance that Izuku could recover, given time. Given time and luck and medicine.

The first scans had revealed that there was no damage on his brain... But the scans had found a lot of damage in other places. The boy's back and arms were bandaged.

All Might had seen the pictures of the wounds. Ugly and raw and half healed. It was enough to know that the villains hadn't been kind to the boy.

He didn't even try to ignore the heavy pang of regret that tore at his heart. He could see all too clearly the boy with the bright, brave eyes. The boy with the dreams of helping others, the boy with the heart of a hero. The boy who he'd wanted as his successor.

The second scans had been so much more worrying. They'd looked at Izuku's brain in more detail after the initial injuries had been dealt with- and the staff were thorough.

 _"We've never seen anything like it before."_

And there had come a different chance, that time.

 _"It has to be a quirk. On the surface everything is fine- we suspect they had to leave his brain intact for- you said it was analysis? There's something... unusual with his temporal lobe."_

All Might sighed, and forced himself to stop pacing. He was just outside the room where Izuku was being kept, and at that very moment, Inko was visiting her son for the first time. She'd requested privacy, and he'd agreed on the condition that he would wait outside on the off chance of anything being triggered.

 _"The temporal lobe is the part of the brain that handles the memory, hearing, sequencing and organisation and understanding language. What this... thing does, we can only speculate. We can only guess if it's permanent."_

Inko had been warned about her son's condition. She had read the files that explained the damage. But All Might knew all too well that there was a difference in reading and _seeing_.

 _"There's still a chance he can recover. But for now, until we can do more scans, we can only conclude to give him time."_

* * *

"They stole my Noumu." Tomura snarled. His hands clawed feverishly at his neck, and he glared at the sceen, his eyes red and furious.

"Stain's betrayal wasn't unexpected." Sensei said silkily. "But his interference regarding Noumu was... unforseen."

"I'm going to kill him." Tomura decided. "He cheated and he stole my Noumu."

"Well, considering all that he knows, we will have to deal with him." Sensei agreed, and there was an unhappy burst of static from the screen.

Kruogiri tended the bar uneasily. He hadn't expected things to go so badly. There were theories now. About Stain's involvement in their attack. Whether or not they were working together.

People were catious. People wanted to join them.

They had no shortage of new recruits. Tomura hadn't been happy, but with Sensei's careful -and Kurogiri wasn't stupid enough to call it guidence- manipulation, Tomura had welcomed in a large number of villains with impressive quirks.

They were stronger for the attack. But they had lost another Noumu to the heroes- and not just any Noumu...

Kurogiri sighed quietly. He didn't want to have to clean up another one of Tomura's temper tantrums. Normally they were directed at Noumu, Kurogiri remembered guiltily. But Noumu had normally been the cause of said temper tantrums, so there was little that Kurogiri could do to redirect them.

"Fine." Tomura's hands stilled, his gaze becoming calculating. "We'll deal with the Hero Killer. Then we'll get my Noumu back."

* * *

Stain hated many things about the aftermath of the attack. His injuries still burned and throbbed angrily with every movement. The fake hero had escaped alive. He'd been forced to work with some of the most despicable villains he'd ever seen.

And then there was this.

"I wanna be just like you, Mr Stainy." The schoolgirl cooed, waving a knife lazily through the air. "You're so cool!"

The other newcomer regarded him mildly, before shrugging. "I agree with your ideals. Some heroes- the fake ones... They need to die."

"And I should trust either of you because..." Stain trailed off meaningfully, raising a single eyebrow.

"Well, you were working with the League -I think that's what they're called- because their monsters attacked at the same time, right?" The girl spoke slowly as she puzzled her way through it. "But you're not with them now, so something went wrong there."

Then she hummed. "And those types of groups will want revenge. So you're against heroes and other villains. You'll need allies."

The young man with the scarred face and dark hair nodded in agreement, then added, after darting a glance at the girl and Stain. "I agree with your ideals. I'll help you kill more of the fake heroes."

There was a story in his eyes. Bitterness and hatred and pain. Stain wondered which hero had broken the man.

Stain, for a moment, considered accepting their help there and then. If there was a fight then he wouldn't get far. If he trusted them, one of them could easily stab him in the back.

So he shrugged. "What are your names?"

The girl beamed. "I'm Toga Himiko!" He vaugely recognised her name from the headlines. An entire school had died at her hand. She was certainly capable, certainly unstable but would certainly be useful.

"I currently go by Dabi." The young man was far more reserved.

Stain normally wouldn't even consider any such offers. But the incident with the League had humbled him. If he wanted to continue- if he wanted a better world- he'd need help. He couldn't be cornered again- he'd only narrowly escaped and was willing to bet that the League were already working to tie up loose ends.

Stain regarded them both thoughtfully. "Meet me here in two days. Then we'll discuss working together."

Neither tried to stop him as he left.

* * *

Inko wasn't sure what to expect. She'd read the files they'd given her, of course she had.

 _'There is a distinct possibility of brain damage.'_

But she couldn't really picture what seeing Izuku would be like. She had imagined the kind of situation her son had been in for months- all pain and fear and silent tears, but she in all honesty had no way of knowing what her son had been through, what he had lived through, what he was like now.

And that terrified her.

 _"I'm fine mum. There's nothing to worry about- I promise."_

Izuku had kept things from her before. She'd known that he'd lied to her with only the best intentions- he knew that she worried about him, and he'd just wanted to help her. But she'd seen how fragile her son looked, and she'd tried everything. She'd phoned the school, she'd talked to Bakugo's parents. Nothing changed.

She'd never felt so useless as when Izuku would tell her that everything was fine. She felt that she'd failed as a mother.

She felt all the regret, all the doubt, all the fear as she walked slowly towards Izuku's hospital room. She pointedly ignored the guards littered around the building- and the scientists with grim faces.

Mr. Yagi was waiting outside. Inko didn't really know a lot about him- just that he was a hero and on the case looking for Izuku. He was the one that kept her informed.

In all honesty, she didn't want to know more about him- she just wanted her son home and safe and _alive_.

Her son was alive and that was enough.

 _'There is a distinct possibility of brain damage.'_

It had to be enough.

"He's in there." Yagi said needlessly. "I've persuaded the staff to let me be the security while you visit. I'll stay outside."

Inko nodded mutely. She didn't want to think about why there'd be a need for security. Because 'dangerous' and the little boy that had loved to play heroes just didn't go together.

The door creaked open as Inko walked into Izuku's hospital room. She felt sick with nerves- what had happened to her son? What was he like? How bad were his injuries?

 _"I-I can still be a hero- r-right?"_

Izuku was awake. He was sitting in a hospital bed, looking very small and broken in the plain white sheets.

His arms were wrapped in clean white bandages- and her eyes were drawn to them. What kind of wounds had been there? The document had said... They were half healed. They were recent.

Some were stab wounds, according to the blunt words printed neatly in the document she'd been given. Others were dark splotchy bruises- like he'd been thrown into walls or heavy objects. And the rest were like... like the skin had simply started disintegrating.

How had her son ended up so badly hurt? She didn't want to know. She wanted to know.

All the while she had been staring at her son- gazing at the messy hair she had been doubting she'd ever see again- he hadn't once looked up.

"Izuku?" She asked softly, suddenly uncertain.

 _'There is a distinct possibility of brain damage.'_

Her son didn't look up, didn't move. He just sat hunched in the bed, unresponsive and he looked almost afraid, almost defensive.

What had happened to him?

"Izuku?" She asked again, louder, feeling a sob build up in her throat. Already her eyes were brimming with tears, that she wiped away furiously. She'd failed Izuku far too many times before now. She never wanted to fail him again.

This time, maybe because her voice was louder, perhaps more commanding to someone that had been obeying orders for months, the boy raised his head, and stared at Inko.

His eyes were unnervingly blank. There was no sign of any recognition.

 _'There is a distinct possibility of brain damage.'_

At that, Inko could take no more, and fled from the room, sobbing. The villains had broken Izuku- she didn't know what they'd done, she'd only seen the broken and beaten Nomou. She'd seen everything Izuku never was, and her heart ached at the thought that her son had suffered and been scared and no one had saved him in time.

No one had saved him from the villains. No one had saved him from his fate. And she didn't know if anyone would be able to fix his brain.

Meanwhile, Nomou sat there, distantly wondering why the word 'Izuku' seemed to have meant something to him.


	9. Chapter 9

For Nomou, the changes were gradual. For days upon days, he sat blankly, waiting for orders, hearing but not really listening to his visitors.

The green haired woman had visited the most, but occasionally a man with vibrant golden hair would come with her.

The both always looked sad. But they weren't the people he was meant to take orders from, so he couldn't talk to them.

They seemed to talk to 'Izuku' though. Nomou wasn't sure why 'Izuku' seemed almost like a order to him...

But most of the time, he was sitting still, surrounded by static and waiting.

Occassionally, there would be spaces in between the static. Those times were rare, and when they happened, Noumu would be filled with fear and relief and _guilt_.

Oddly enough, the breaks in the static had become more and more frequent, something that honestly terrified Noumu.

He didn't know why he was scared whenever there was a break in the static, but he wasn't sure he wanted to remember. Because he could remember Tomura's cruel smile. He could remember the gleam of metal in the darkness, and he could remember the smell of blood.

But whether he liked it or not, the time when the static peeled away was becoming more and more frequent as the days wore by.

 _You really were a hero to the very end, Nomou. I think if you remembered who you were, you'd be proud."_

Whether he liked it or not, it had been several months since he'd been dragged to Sensei.

 _"I'm so sorry..."_

And slowly, slowly Nomou was remembering. Slowly, slowly Nomou was recovering.

 _"Izuku?"_

Until one day, the static just vanished, and Izuku remembered everything.

* * *

All Might walked down the halls, idly noting that the staff seemed busier than usual.

He wasn't surprised, there had been a nasty villain attack earlier that day, and it had caused chaos.

No wonder the staff were so busy. There had been so many injured. It was truly horrifying to see the work of the new villains. They'd been inspired by the attack launched by the League and Stain.

And now new villains seemed to be trying to out-do each other in terms of destruction. It was horrifying to witness.

It was also the reason Inko wasn't currently with him. She'd called him ealier and explained that she couldn't visit until later in the evening due to the traffic caused by one of the villain attacks, and so she'd asked him to visit Izuku instead.

Even though the boy was unresponsive at best, neither of them liked the idea of Izuku sitting alone in the hospital room, surrounded by silence and white walls.

He'd heard Inko's stories of a young boy who'd dreamed of being a hero. Stories of a young boy who always tried to help others. Stories of a boy with a bright smile and brighter eyes.

He'd seen enough of that boy for himself, when Izuku had run to save his childhood friend, and he'd seen enough to want the boy as his successor.

And so he could understand where Inko was coming from. The woman completely _refused_ to give up on her son, she visited him every day. She didn't want him to be alone if- when a miracle happened.

But it had been months, and as much as he hated it, All Might was beginning to doubt. It had been months, and Izuku hadn't shown any signs of reaction, any signs of recognition... any signs of life.

As he drew closer to Izuku's room, there were practically no staff, aside from one frantic nurse, racing down the corridor with a pale face. If All Might had to guess, she'd just been called to the emergency ward.

All Might stopped in front of the door with a frown. He could hear a faint noise. His eyes narrowed as he opened the door, because he could have sworn that he'd heard sobbing, but that would be-

impossible.

Izuku Midoriya was hunched into a tight ball in the too-big hospital bed and was crying openly, his entire body shaking with the force of his sobs.

His eyes were so different to the lifeless, dull orbs they had been faced with before. No, these eyes were intelligent, so full of life: so unbearably sad and so unbearably guilty.

"Young Midoriya?" All Might asked, the words catching in his throat. The boy flinched when he realised he had company, and turned to stare at the pro hero with wide, red-rimmed eyes.

"A-All Might?" The whisper was hoarse, almost disbelieving. "Why are you here?"

"Your mother asked me to be here." All Might answered absently, still not quite believing that this was happening. It felt so _wrong_ that he was here instead of Inko.

"S-she visited d-didn't s-she?" The boy's expression, if possible grew even more distraught, vibrant green eyes flooding with tears as the boy's hands shook. "B-both of y-you did a-and I couldn't e-even tell, n-not really."

All Might blinked, his blood running cold. Had Midoriya been unable to register their presence because of what All for One did. (Because it was All for One, because All Might _knew_. He knew that the bastard loved breaking things. He'd break them again and again. And the quirks were another indication... Too many things pointed towards another one of All Might's failures.)

"I-I'm sorry. I-I'm s-so, so sorry!" And suddenly the boy was sobbing, his expression etched with pure anguish.

"I-I didn't h-have a c-choice. I d-didn't want to do a-any of it." Izuku shrunk in on himself, seeming small and scared and sorry. "I-I... I never wanted to be a villain."

After that final, broken whisper, All Might realised how hopelessly underprepared and underqualified he is to deal with this.

He can't just smile at the boy and say that everything will be all right. Because heroes couldn't save him when the villains got him, because the heroes couldn't undo the damage the villains did to his brain... And heroes couldn't magically make everything okay again, no matter how much they wanted to.

"None of it is your fault." All Might found himself saying, although the words sounded lame, even to him. "You didn't ask the villains to kidnap you."

"I..." Izuku blinked, then looked down at his scarred hands. "I-I could have done t-things differently. I could have p-pretended to agree w-when they asked me to j-join them. Then, at least I could have t-tried to c-control how much damage I did." The young boy trailed of miserably, closing his eyes in defeat.

"They asked you to join them?" All Might choked out in disbelief. He wasn't sure why it never occured to him that the villains- that All for One- would offer Izuku a choice, maybe because they were confident he'd accept, maybe they just wanted to play mind games and make the boy break himself, maybe...

"I said no." For a second the tears and the guilt adn the shame are gone, and Izuku looked grimly satisfied. "I knew it wouldn't end well, but I couldn't just give up and agree to hurt innocent people because I was _scared_."

Once again, All Might was struck with just how plain heroic the boy was. How the boy with the big heart and big dreams managed to be stronger than even some of the pro heroes he knew.

He really would have made a good successor.

"My boy... That... That was very brave." All Might managed to say. He could imagine what kind of state of mind the boy would have been in. He'd seen how _crushed_ the boy looked when All Might had destroyed his dreams. He'd seen how scared the boy had looked when he ran forwards to save his childhood friend when not even the pro heroes could. And he saw the bitter acceptance when he was scolded for trying by the very heroes that hadn't moved to help.

To deny the chance for revenge after that...

"They even offered me a quirk." Izuku snorted, quietly, bitterly. He stared at his hands, remembering when he thought that wasn't possible. He still wished it wasn't possible, that he had never been Noumu.

Meanwhile, All Might was struck speechless. To deny the villains even after being offered a quirk, the very thing that had ruined his dreams...

All Might wished more than ever that he'd been faster on that day, because it would have saved the boy so much suffering, because there's really no one else he could see being such a perfect successor.

Then, suddenly his phone vibrated, startling them both.

 **Inko: I've just arrived at the hospital. I'll be there in a few moments. Sorry for being so late!**

"Who was that?" Izuku asked, before what he'd just asked and flushing. All Might shrugged, not really minding. Better embarrased than crying.

"Your mother. She'll be here in a minute." All Might said carefully, watching Izuku's reaction. The boy gasped, eyes beoming large and disbelieving, before brimming with tears once the greif and guilt and pain came crashing back.

All Might was reminded of the boy's mother- a woman mourning the loss of her son, mourning the damage done to her son, mourning the fact that he'd become so broken and she couldn't fix it.

He hoped the two would be able to help each other heal. They deserved a happy ending.

* * *

Izuku remembered the last time he _saw_ his mother. The last time it was him and not Noumu. He'd called goodbye as he'd left for school. He'd seen his mother breifly, smiling at him as she made breakfast, but he'd overslept and had to rush, so he couldn't linger to chat.

He'd run out of the door and he hadn't looked back. He wished that he'd looked back. He wished that he could have thanked her, told her he loved her.

He wished he could have come home to her.

He remembered her visits less clearly. Enough to tell what was going on, but they were hazy and he couldn't tell what he was thinking... If he was thinking at all.

He wanted to see her again. He didn't think he could see her again.

Because he remembered all the times she'd been there for him. He remembered that she had been all that he had. He remembered that she would always be his mother and she would always love him.

But he also remembered the way he'd been ready to kill Stain. He remembered the way the static had wraped around his brain. He remembered Sensei's cold, reassuring voice.

He wasn't sure he could look his mother in the eyes, with all the things he had done.

* * *

Inko was expecting the worst when she opened the door to Izuku's hospital room. She was expecting her son to still be staring forwards with glassy eyes, to still be unresponsive, to still be Noumu.

She hoped for otherwise. She wanted her son back more than she wanted anything else in the world.

So when she opened the door to see Izuku crying and Toshinori awkwardly trying to comfort him, everything stopped.

Izuku's eyes were bright with emotions. Izuku was finally aware of everything. Izuku was finally _home_.

"Izuku?" She asked quietly, not quite daring to believe it. After so long...

"M-mum?"

And suddenly she was hugging her son close, sobbing and promising to never let him go again. And he was clinging to her like she was a lifeline.

Because Izuku had been kidnapped, experimented on and forced to work for villains. Because Izuku wouldn't ever quite be the same. Because, all in all, Izuku was still just a child and Inko was still his mother.

Everthing was different, everything had changed, but that at least would stay the same.


	10. Chapter 10

Izuku had never realised how hard talking was. It wasn't a surprise. It couldn't have possibly been a surprise.

Of course the police would want to know everything. Of course he'd have to say everything that happened to him.

Starting was the hardest. His mother was sitting at his side, and All Might was there, sending him a reassuring smile.

Funny, how he'd admired that smile before the villains had made him into Nomou. Funny how he still admired the smile even after everything.

Funny how after everything had changed, a mere smile was able to calm him. Even after everything had changed, he still admired heroes, admired All Might.

And his mother had grabbed his hand to let him know that he was okay. He was safe. He wasn't with the villains anymore.

So he started with the ending of everything normal.

"You last saw me after the incident with the Sludge Villain, r-right?" He asked hesitantly, and the grave-faced police officer nodded.

He shuddered, and continued.

He hated thinking of how weak he had been. Of how weak he still was. He hated thinking of how he'd been like a puppet, how he couldn't even think.

He hated how he'd been a villain.

That was what he was, wasn't it? He'd fought for them, he'd analysed all those heroes, all those heroes in training for them, and far, far too many times he'd nearly killed for them.

A part of him knew that he hadn't had a choice. That he couldn't do anything _but_ obey orders, because that was all Nomou was meant to do. That was all Nomou _could_ do.

But another, stronger part of him remembered Tomura's red eyes, his hands clawing at his neck and an insane, cruel laugh ringing through the eerie silence.

So when Izuku talks and talks and lists off everything that happened to him like he's living through it again, he's already expecting punishment.

He'd wanted to be a hero. A hero.

How had he ended up as a villain?

He wasn't sure when he started crying, only that his voice is surprisingly steady, even when he has to try several times to finish a sentence.

He finished talking, and found himself unable to meet any of their eyes. For a moment, it's like he's Nomou again, and he's not sure when he'll next be punished or caught in one of Tomura's tantrums.

Then the police officer clears his throat, and stands. "I'm sorry you had to go through all of that kid, but rest assured that we'll do all within our power to bring justice to the entire League."

Izuku still hadn't looked up, when All Might quietly questioned the officer. "Will that be all you need?"

"That was the full account, so we don't need anything else. He's free to go." The officer said with a strained smile. "Make sure he recovers, okay? Poor kid..."

Izuku's mind was suddenly caught on those last words.

 _"He's free to go."_

"W-Why?" His voice was hoarse from all the crying, but he can almost feel how all of the adults freeze at his question.

"W-Why? Y-You heard it all, r-right?" He dimly realised that he was crying again, or maybe he just never stopped. "I-I h-helped them... S-so I'm a v-villain, r-right?"

The police officer just looked sad. "Kid... You were under the influence of a brainwashing quirk. There's a whole section of the law about people who were forced into working for villains like that. You didn't want to do any of that stuff, you couldn't even think for yourself. No, kid, you're not a villain. The world is rarely that black and white. If anything, you're a victim."

And then he nodded to them all, and left the hospital room. Izuku just stared after him, for a moment, feeling very overwhelmed and very, very small.

For a moment, Izuku wondered if he will ever get better. If he would ever be able to move past the guilt.

And then his mother was hugging him and All Might managed a small smile, and Izuku remembered that he wasn't so alone after all.

* * *

Bakugo found out about Izuku's situation through a newspaper. A fucking _newspaper_.

Clearly, whoever was involved wanted to keep it hushed up. The rational part of him almost couldn't blame them. A quirkless boy being snatched off the streets was worrying enough. A quirkless boy being captured by and experimented on by villains was even worse.

And the quirkless boy wasn't quite so quirkless anymore.

The story was leaked. The hospital Izuku was staying in had been crowded, and someone had caught a glimpse of him, and the news had spread like wildfire.

All the public knew was that he was safe. Recovering.

Bakugo snarled when he saw the paper, and before he realised what he was doing he'd burned it with his quirk, and his gut lurched as he saw the awkward smile that had been plastered wither as the paper shrivelled and blackened in his grip.

He wanted answers. He wanted them badly.

"I know today's news was shocking, but can you all _please_ focus on your studies." Aizawa growled and Bakugo forcibly shoved the thoughts of the stupid quirkless Deku from his mind and returned his focus on the lesson.

* * *

"Ah, Inko?"

The woman turned to face Toshinori with a small smile. "Yes?"

"Well, a few students were requesting permission to visit Izuku. I thought it'd be best to leave it up to you, though."

"I... Who were the students?" Inko blinked. She wasn't sure how to help Izuku. He'd been in a constant state of guilt since he'd talked to the police officer, and she knew there had to be a way to help him.

"One is Ochako Uraraka. If I recall correctly, she's the one Izuku saved at the USJ." The pro hero told her. "Tenya Iida, the one that helped Izuku fight off Stain..."

Inko was surprised to find herself nodding. Izuku had helped these people. Maybe if he could see that he had saved people... It would be worth a shot.

"And the third?"

"Katsuki Bakugo." All Might said gravely, and Inko can't help but frown.

 _"I'm fine mum, really." Her son smiled nervously, and tugged his sleeves down further to hide the burns._

 _Another time, and Izuku is sporting a black eye and several bruises. He can't pretend nothing happened, so he just twists the truth, and she knows it. "We just ended up playing a little rough, that's all."_

 _"I'm fine. I promise."_

"I... I think the first two students would be good for him... I think he'd be happier if he knew that he'd helped people. But Bakugo... I'm not too sure."

Toshinori smiled. "You're right. I think knowing that he did some good would help him a great deal... Does Izuku have a history with Young Bakugo?"

 _"I'm fine. I promise."_

Inko smiled, but it was strained. "Yes. They were friends once."

They both didn't mention it again, after that.

* * *

Uraraka wasn't sure what to expect when she was led to the hospital room. She'd thought of the boy with the dead eyes more often than she would have liked to admit.

He'd saved her. He'd saved her and she didn't know what happened to him. He'd saved her and she hadn't even thanked him for it.

 _"I know it sounds weird, but I can't help but wonder if maybe he got into trouble for helping me."_

She was meant to be a hero. How could she be a hero if someone else could have been hurt for helping her?

So she entered the hospital room determined to help the boy who had helped her.

He looked different from how she remembered. Back then, he had been scared and hurt and he'd seemed almost dead.

He looked better. His eyes were full of life, and he was staring at her nervously, instinctively flinching away from the noise of the door opening.

"Hi!" She said brightly, smiling at him, because she remembered the scared boy in the missing poster and the boy with the dead eyes.

"I'm Ochako Uraraka. I don't know if you remember, but you saved me!" She was less certain now, suddenly nervous. But his expression changed and he looked shocked, if anything.

"But... But it was m-my fault you were in d-danger in the first place." The shock settled into a mask of complete misery and Uraraka's heart clenched at the thought.

"No, that was the villains." She blurted, and suddenly she found that she couldn't stop talking. "I was sure I was going to die, but you saved me! And all this time I've wanted to thank you, because you could have killed me and you didn't, and... And I'm really sorry, because I think you got into trouble for helping me."

Somewhere in the middle of her rant, she started crying, and by the end of it, Izuku was crying.

"I didn't want to hurt you. Or Kacchan. I'm really, really sorry." And then they're both sobbing and saying sorry.

Izuku was still feeling guilty over everything he'd done. He'd hurt people, and he'd never, ever wanted to hurt anyone. It was the reason he'd refused to join the villains. It was the reason he'd wanted to be a hero. And it'd all happened anyway.

Uraraka was still struggling to cope with the USJ incident, even though it happened so long ago. She'd nearly died. Her friends had nearly died. And someone had been hurt for helping her, she had been so sure. Then she'd found out that one of her classmates had been one of the people to hurt someone weaker than him, and suddenly the world wasn't so bright anymore.

"W-we're both kind of a mess right now, a-aren't we?" Uraraka managed a weak laugh through her tears.

"Y-yeah." Izuku agreed.

Uraraka frowned, then she remembered why she'd entered the room in the first place. She wiped away her tears and smiled again.

"How about we try this again. Hi! I'm Ochako Uraraka, nice to meet you!"

For a moment, Izuku loooked terrified, completely overwhelmed and close to crying again. Then he managed a much weaker smile.

"I-I'm Izuku Midoriya."

And that was the start of their friendship.

* * *

Iida was less sure about what he was going to say.

 _"They're both monsters. Get away."_

He knew that he needed to talk to the green haired boy. The one that had been called a monster. The one that Stain had called a lost cause. The one that had saved him.

The boy had saved Iida from himself. The boy had been someone to protect, and it had taken his mind away from the thought of revenge, and through that Iida had found a way to be a hero... a way to make Tensei proud.

But the boy was the missing quirkless Izuku Midoriya. And Izuku had a quirk, or had when he was fighting Stain, and none of it made any _sense._

But none of that mattered. He needed to thank Izuku. He needed to apologise to Izuku.

Iida wasn't sure how he'd say any of it, because it was all too confusing, only that he needed to say it.

But as soon as he opened the door, Midoriya turned to look at him, and his eyes were eerily intent for a moment. Iida froze, unsure of what to do.

Then the moment passed, and Izuku laughed nervously. "Sorry, it's a really bad habit... Y-you're the o-one that saved me from S-Stain- y-you're Ingenium r-right?"

Iida blinked. "I- yes- that is my hero name."

The boy's face lit up. "Thank you so much. I- you saved me, not just from Stain a-and..." He trailed off, his eyes growing distant with memories.

"Ah, Midoriya? I'm the one who should be thanking you. Without your presence on the battlefield, I am certain that I would have died." Iida interrupted, causing the boy to stare at him. But he didn't speak, so Iida continued. "Stain was a formidable opponent, and you had been fighting him off admirably."

"I..." Midoriya frowned, looking hopelessly lost for a moment. "I... No, I wouldn't have been able to keep fighting for much longer, so you really did save me... T-thank you."

Iida still didn't think the boy was right, but it looked like Izuku would be reduced to tears soon, so he let it slide. "I... It was merely the duty of a hero." He said, and tried not to think of Tensei.

"You're going to be a great hero, then." Izuku beamed at him, still pale and uncertain, but seeming so much happier.

 _"Iida, take the name Ingenium. D-don't let i-it die."_

Iida smiled. "Thank you Midoriya." And he wondered if somewhere, Tensei would be watching him and if somewhere, Tensei was proud of him.

* * *

Later, Izuku wondered what he had done to deserve the friends that came to visit him regularly. Uraraka always made a point to be cheerful and friendly, and she rarely stopped smiling. Iida was always careful and sometimes even a little stern, but he was friendly and willing to talk to Izuku nonetheless.

And All Might and his mother were always visiting, too. They always tried to put a smile on his face, and more often than not, it worked.

He wasn't Nomou anymore. He had friends now. He was ready to start moving forwards and leave the memories of the villains, of Nomou behind him and start getting better.


	11. Chapter 11

Izuku had known that the road to recovery would be long and difficult and painful. He'd known that it'd take time.

He hadn't expected to have to see a therapist, though.

Looking back, it was obvious. He was traumatised, still waking up screaming and scared of his own... own quirks.

Having quirks was still so _surreal._ Before, he'd always been useless, worthless, _quirkless._ But the second he'd been given a quirk, multiple quirks, everything had got _worse_.

It was funny, he'd always imagined quirks as something great, something to look up to, something that saved people. And he was scared of his own power.

Every time he so much as thought of using his quirks, memories would come pouring back, and he'd feel sick.

He'd remember his skin turning the colour of starlight as he fought to kill Stain. He'd remember the world fading away then _sharpening,_ and everything feeling like ice.

Maybe it was just pathetic, to be scared of a power he'd longed for back when he had nothing, but all he could associate his quirks with was memories of the villains and a cold, terrible voice sighing.

( _"Forced quirk activation." )_

He was scared that he couldn't control his quirks without orders. He was scared that he was going to end up hurting someone again. He was scared that he'd overuse his quirks and somehow go back to being Nomou.

So when his mother and All Might eventually found out about all of his fears, he was signed up for therapy, both quirk therapy and someone capable of helping with his trauma.

* * *

Todoroki would later have to say that the turning point was the Sports Festival. That was what had _really_ grated at his father's nerves. At the time, that'd been his goal, anyway. At the time, he hadn't cared about losing, just so long as he didn't use his father's power. At the time, it'd been worth it.

He'd lost because he'd only used half of his power. But that was fine. He wouldn't fufill his father's dreams. He refused.

He still refused, even after the internships. He hadn't chosen to go with his father, and his father hadn't offered. That had suited Todoroki just fine. He'd chosen a small agency with heroes that were almost unheard of.

They'd taught him more about being a hero than Endeavour ever had. They hadn't been in it for the fame, for the money, for the rankings.

They'd wanted to help people. They hadn't cared about being rich or famous or thanked. They only cared about doing the right thing.

He'd admired them. He thought that maybe, if she could see them, his mother would like them, too.

He hadn't been able to stomach the thought of visiting his mother, and even if he could, he knew that Endeavour, growing increasinly irritated, anger ready to boil over and explode.

And eventaully, Endeavour _had_ exploded.

 _"I've indulged your tantrum for long enough."_

For three miserable weeks, he'd had to hide his injuries from training sessions. Not that anyone was looking too closely. Despite the various efforts from his classmates, he'd pushed them all away, too fixed on revenge, too fixed on himself. He regretted it later. He regretted it all.

In the end, Aizawa had noticed. He'd called Todoroki back after class one day, and with the most serious expression Todoroki had ever seen, asked what was wrong.

Of course, it took Todoroki a while to spill the story, but Aizawa was nothing if not relentless when it came to the wellbeing of his students. And after the man eventually had the full story... He'd been furious. The only time that had compared to Aizawa's anger had been the villain attack.

Maybe he should have been scared, but it was oddly nice, having someone be so angry on his behalf. It had been a long, long time since someone had cared enough to be angry for him.

Long story short, there was going to be a case against Endeavour. It would take a while, because they needed to gather evidence to use against him. But when it happened, it would be devestating, and Endeavour wouldn't be able to wriggle away this time.

He wasn't sure how to feel. Relieved. After years and years he would be free from it all, and that meant more than him than he could put into words. He would be able to visit his mother without worrying that his father would find out and hurt her. He would be able to live without the threat of his father hanging over him, and it would be like stepping out of a shadow.

He would be able to become a hero because he wanted to be a hero. Not because he was the son of the Number Two hero. Not because it was expected of him. Not because his father needed a weapon to surpass All Might.

But then came therapy. To undo the damage done by his father. To help him with accepting _that_ power.

At first he was reluctant, angry, scared. He didn't want a power that reminded him of his father. He wouldn't give his father any satisfaction.

But, his therapist had explained patiently, it wasn't his father's quirk, it was his quirk.

It wasn't quite so easy. A few magic words didn't erase years of pain and years of resolve. A few magic words didn't suddenly make the world okay again.

But it was a start, and that was enough for him.

Another thing he'd struggled with was making friends. His therapist had told him about the importance of having bonds with other people. But the thought of reaching out to the classmates he had pushed away time and time again just seemed... awkward.

He thought that, all things considered, he was progressing rather well, even if he had issues with making friends and socialising.

But that issue, too, seemed to solve itself.

One day, when he walked into the waiting room for his appointment, another boy about his age was there. The boy had messy green hair, freckles scattered across his face and he had dark rings under his eyes.

He jumped when he heard Shouto enter, then laughed nervously. "S-sorry. I'm just a l-little jumpy s-sometimes." The boy apologised.

Todoroki forced a polite smile. "That's fine." Inwardly, he wondered why the boy looked familar. He knew that he'd seen the face somewhere before, but he couldn't think _where._

"You're Shouto Todoroki, right?" The boy asked curiously, then flushed. "S-sorry, I-I saw when I watched the... the Sports Festival."

For a second, when he spoke, the boy's expression changed and became flooded with guilt and shame and fear. But it was gone so quickly that Todoroki almost thought that he'd imagined it. Almost.

"Your control over your quirk was very impressive." The boy commented lamely, studying the floor.

"...Thanks?" Todoroki wasn't quite sure how to respond. He half wished that the awkward silence would be broken by one of them being called to their appointments, but there was no such luck.

"What's your name?" He asked, wishing he had more experience with actually talking to people. People that weren't after his father's name, his father's fame, his father's weapon.

"I'm Izuku Midoriya." The boy smiled slightly. It was the small, timid smile of someone only just realising that it was okay to smile again. Todoroki knew how that felt all too well.

That _did_ explain the familiar face. Everyone had seen the missing posters. Everyone had seen that face on the news. Everyone knew the story of the quirkless boy.

Todoroki had questions, of course. It was well known that Midoriya had been kidnapped by villains. It was unclear when he'd been saved. It was also well known that Midoriya was quirkless. This place specialised in controlling quirks and mental health.

No doubt Izuku had questions too. Why was the son of the Number Two hero in a place that dealt with mental health? Todoroki had demonstrated his perfect control of his ice quirk, so why was he here?

To their credit, neither of them asked any of their questions. Instead, they'd talk about nothing at all.

Even if they never discussed anything meaningful, even if neither of them knew anything about the other, the simple conversations were better than the silence.

And that suited both of them just fine.

* * *

Eventually, Izuku told Todoroki about the villains and the experiments and his quirks. In turn, Todoroki eventually told Izuku about the reason he hated his fire quirk and his father.

In a way, even though it was all so horrible, it was nice to have someone else who understood what it was like to hate a part of yourself, to be scared of something that was yours and yours alone.

"I just feel so guilty." Izuku admitted to Todoroki in one of their conversations. "Because I _know_ that my quirks... They came from other people... And... And... I-I hurt p-people w-with a power that was never meant to be m-mine."

By the end of Izuku's confession, he was crying and trembling. Todoroki awkwardly patted Izuku's shoulder. He wished he knew what to do, but he didn't know what to do. He didn't know what would make it all better.

So he just tried his best.

"First of all, the villains forced you to hurt people with the quirks they gave you. You didn't _want_ to hurt anyone. Secondly, none of that was your fault. Why else would the villains give you quirks if they weren't going to make you do what they want?"

Izuku had stopped crying, which was good. Todoroki took that as a sign to continue.

"So I think that when _you_ use your quirks, it'll be for good. I don't think it matters what you did with the villains, because that wasn't you."

"I... Thank you, Shouto." Izuku said finally, in a small voice but with the brightest smile Todoroki had ever seen.

* * *

Izuku did talk to Bakugo eventually. It was only after he'd been going to therapy for several months, only after he'd already started healing.

By the time he talked to Bakugo, he'd been allowed to go back to living with his mother, provided that there was always a hero stationed nearby, just in case the villains wanted revenge. They never came, though, and eventually their guard was removed.

Around that time, Izuku asked his mother if he could speak to Bakugo. It just seemed... wrong to leave things as they were.

Thinking that didn't make Izuku any less uneasy when he was faced with the glaring red eyes of his childhood friend. He was reminded of Tomura, for a moment.

"Shitty Deku."

 _"You're useless, Nomou!"_

"What the fuck happened to you?"

 _"You ruined everything!"_

Unconsciously, Izuku rubbed his arms, where the scars from one of Tomura's tantrums still lingered, like ugly banners so he'd never, ever forget.

"Nice to see you too, Kacchan." Izuku said softly. Then he shrugged. "I was kidnapped by villains."

Bakugo's expression didn't change, but his eyes softened slightly, maybe with shock, maybe with pity. It didn't really matter, because that one, tiny change was enough for Izuku to forget all about Tomura for a moment.

"Why are you here, Kacchan? Why did you want to talk to me?" Izuku sighed, suddenly very, very tired.

"I wanted answers." Bakugo growled.

"Like?" Izuku prompted. He was beginning to realise that Bakugo wasn't so scary anymore. Bakugo could never be as scary as Tomura, even at his worst.

"How do you have a quirk? I was there at USJ, I saw your quirks."

"Experiments." Izuku told him flatly. He'd struggled and struggled to come to terms with everything, but he was beginning to accept it, beginning to move on. He still didn't want to linger on unpleasant topics anymore. He just wanted it all to be over.

"Is that all?"

When Bakugo didn't answer, Izuku turned to walk away. He'd managed two steps before Bakugo started yelling.

"Oi, you damn nerd! Listen, because I'm only saying this once!" Bakugo bellowed at the retreating teen. "I'm sorry, okay. I'm sorry for being such a shit. I'm sorry I didn't save you!"

Izuku turned just in time to see Bakugo furiously wiping his eyes. Within seconds, Bakugo had turned and had stormed away.

"Thanks, Kacchan." Izuku said softly, not caring that the other teen was long gone and wouldn't hear him.

Then he turned, and began walking home, feeling lighter than he had in years.


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N: So this was nearly the last chapter, but I couldn't wrap everything up without this getting insanely long... So the next chapter will probably be the last, unless there's a really big plot point I somehow miss... Knowing me there probably will be XD**

 **That being said, I hope you've all enjoyed this so far, and thank you all for your feedback! :D**

 **And as usual, I own nothing.**

* * *

Eventually, Izuku had to decide what he wanted to do next.

Of course, it's after months of therapy and healing. Moving onwards and forwards wasn't easy. It never was. But he had family and friends beside him each step of the way: his mum, All Might and Uraraka, Iida and Shouto.

He still wasn't sure what he'd done to deserve them. Before, he'd been quirkless and useless and only got in the way. After, he'd been broken and bloodstained and so, so sorry.

But even though he thought that he doesn't deserve any of them in his life, they decided for him, and he was happy.

Happy... It had been a long time since he'd been happy before he found friends. He was glad he found them, or they found him, and he knew that he wouldn't have recovered without them by his side.

But after recovering, he was left with a choice. He has a future, even though so recently there was a time where he wouldn't have believed it, and he has to choose where he wants to go next.

It would be easy to leave it all behind. It'd be so, so easy to go to some normal school in some normal place and all the conflict would happen far, far away, and he'd read about it in the news and he'd be safe.

But...

 _"I-I can still be a hero, right?"_

But he'll never be normal, not after the villains, not after _everything._ He didn't think that he'd ever be free of the nightmares, because they're a part of him, his past and his future. He didn't think that he'd ever get over the guilt, either.

 _"So I think that when_ you _use your quirks, it'll be for good."_

And in the end, he already knew what he wanted to do, it just took him a while to realise it. He didn't want to be a villain, he never wanted to be a villain, he never wanted to hurt people.

But he'd always wanted to be a hero.

As a hero, he could help people. As a hero, he can repent for everything. As a hero, he can be who he wanted to be, not who the villains made him in to.

And there was no better satire of Nomou, of the monster the villains made, than the hero he had vowed to become.

* * *

"I think I want to be a hero." It was All Might that he told first, because in a way, his journey had started with All Might. Being told he couldn't be a hero. Running in to save Kacchan. Being kidnapped by Kurogiri.

Maybe he still wanted acknowledgement from his idol. Maybe he was scared of being crushed again and just wanted to get it out of the way.

But All Might _beamed_.

"That's excellent!" The hero boomed.

Izuku blinked. "Wait, what?" He wasn't sure what he'd expected. Shock, maybe regret, maybe disappointment. Not pride.

All Might faltered at that. He hadn't told Izuku about how close the boy had been to being his successor. It had seemed cruel, after all the boy had been through, to taunt him with what could have been.

Instead, he bowed his head. "I'm sorry, young Midoriya. I should have said this earlier. I was wrong. You would have made an excellent hero. You proved as much when you ran forward to save young Bakugo."

Izuku had frozen, and was staring at All Might with shock written all over his face.

All Might smiled fondly and ruffled his hair. "You'll be a great hero, my boy."

There was a moment of silence, and All Might pretended not to see as Izuku wiped away his tears.

Then: "Do you know which school you'll apply to?"

Izuku laughed nervously. "I h-hadn't exactly p-planned that far ahead."

All Might smiled. For a moment, he seemed almost sad. "You disappeared before you could take any enterance exams, or even choose a school, but your application to UA still stands. You could try there, maybe meet with the Principal."

Izuku smiled. "I'd like that."

* * *

As it turned out, the Principal was impressed enough with Izuku to let him in. He had been told of Izuku's time with the villains, and his fight against Stain.

He'd been told about the experiments too, and All Might had always wondered if the Principal had felt any empathy for what Izuku had been through.

In the end, it didn't really matter. The Principal had liked Izuku enough to let him in, and that was more than enough for All Might.

It wasn't as much trouble as it could have been, really.

The villains had become increasingly active after the incident in Hosu. All trying to outdo each other. They'd been given a purpose then, to act against heroes, to fight for what they believed in, to destroy the world.

The fact there were two very clearly rival groups didn't help. The League and Stain's group. They were clearly rivals, and with the stirrings of the Yakuza, things weren't looking good.

But where there were shadows, there was also light. All over Japan, hero courses had expanded to accept more students. Slotting Izuku Midoriya into class 1-A hadn't been an issue. Apparently some students from the General Education department had moved into the hero classes as well.

So Izuku could begin his way down the path to heroics in that regard with very few issues.

The most pressing problem, however, was the media.

Izuku had been quirkless. Then he'd been kidnapped, and the media had almost the whole country holding its breath waiting for news of his return. He'd been found, and the media had covered that, too.

And now, the poor, kidnapped quirkless boy wasn't so quirkless and wanted to be a hero. This was going to be news. Big news.

"There's going to be an interview?" For a moment, Izuku's vivid eyes were alight with panic, and All Might could see the boy shaking slightly.

"There's no need to worry!" The hero said with his signature grin. "It'll be fine. I'll help you prepare and everything."

"W-what i-if I mess it u-up?" Sadly, Izuku still looked terrified, he was pale and he was subconsciously curling in on himself.

"You won't, my boy." All Might chuckled. Idly, he could remember Nana helping him before one if his interviews. It'd been fairly early on in his career, and he was just as nervous as Izuku.

 _"Just smile, Toshi, and you'll be fine."_

All Might smiled at the memory, thinking of Nana's bright, beaming face.

When the image faded, Izuku was smiling hesitantly, still slightly nervous at the thought of having to speak, probably about his experiences with the villains.

 _"Remember, when all seems hopeless, that's when you need to smile."_

"You'll be an excellent hero, Young Midoriya." All Might said quietly, and imagined that the ghost of his teacher was smiling at them.

* * *

Weak sunlight wormed its way through the cracks in the grimy glass. Stain was holed up in an abandoned building, and would remain there for a few more days.

He'd never really dared to dream of the magnitude he was currently working at. He had an organisation behind him now. All people prepared to fight for their beliefs, for his beliefs.

And he could _feel_ the change. It was in the uneasiness in the air. It was in the way people would glance around nervously whenever they left their houses. It was so, so obious in the way that schools were churning out heroes and heroes were stuggling to defeat the big bad villains, to save the lives of the civilians.

The world was changing, slowly but surely. The villains were changing, fighting amonst each other, for recognition, for something more than money, for something more than survival. The heroes were changing, saving lives first, checking the ratings later.

And speaking of changes in heroes...

That morning's newspaper was clutched in both hands as he studied it intently. There was a transcript of an interview with 'shocking' news.

The little quirkless Izuku Midoriya wasn't so quirkless anymore. That wasn't even shocking. No, Stain remembered the dead eyes of the Nomou. Stain remembered the way the boy had fought him, sharp and fast and deadly. He remembered the way the young hero- Ingenium had fought to save him- all desperation and defiance and _hero._

 _"I won't let you kill anyone else."_

No, the fact that the Nomou had quirks wasn't surprising. The fact that the boy had recovered was more of a surprise, that was a given. Stain remembered the boy's eyes, even from so long ago. Flat and glassy, like he was already dead. But...

 _"Sensei fixed him right? It should last for at least a few more months."_

But his recovery hadn't been impossible, clearly. So what if one of the League's experiments had escaped and recovered.

No, the _interesting_ part was that the former Nomou had decided to become a hero.

It was revealed almost straight away that the kid had been experimented on, and escaped. But it was also made clear that Izuku Midoriya would be aiming to be a hero.

He could have easily walked away from the whole mess. But he hadn't. He could have easily been another fake hero, scrambling to take advantage of the surge of villains to make a name for himself, as some form of petty revenge.

But there were a last few words in the interview, a question that he clearly hadn't been prepared for. His answer had contained startling honesty, which stood out to Stain, maybe because of the question itself, maybe because of the answer.

 _"Why do you want to be a hero?"_

 _"I... I want to stop villains like the ones that took me so that nobody else has to ever go through what I did. I want to be a hero so nobody ever has to feel alone and abandoned... I just want to help people who need it, I guess."_

Stain smiled and dropped the paper. "That was an interesting article." He commented.

Dabi merely grunted. He'd been the one to collect the newspaper from whichever grunt had actually bought it, since they were all too recognisable now. He'd also had the most time to read and digest the article.

Toga, however, was beaming. "He seems so cool!" She squealed, a small blush on her face. "I wonder if he really will become a good hero. I can't wait to find out!"

Stain smirked. "Heroes _are_ changing. But that doesn't mean that we don't still have work to do."

At that Dabi grinned and Toga's smile twisted. "Well, what are we waiting for? Let's get to work!"

* * *

On his first day at UA, Izuku's friends were waiting for him. He'd literally just walked through the gates to find the three of them waiting for him.

"Well," Todoroki had said with a small smile. "We wouldn't want to getting lost, would we, Izuku?"

"I still can't believe you're coming to UA! It's going to be so cool!" Uraraka beamed, bouncing up and down slightly.

"It's most fortunate that we can continue our studies of heroics together." Iida announced with a smile.

And so Izuku was escorted to his first class by his somewhat protective group of friends.

Thankfully, he wasn't the only one transferring to class 1-A on that day. Shinsou Hitoshi from the General Education department had also transferred.

Their homeroom teacher glared at them both for a moment, with his unnerving piercing gaze, before shrugging.

"You'll both be fine, I guess. Now go find some seats or something."

And just like that, everything fell into place.

Once glare from Uraraka stopped anyone from asking him any awkward questions about his quirks or time with the villains, and Iida ensured that both he and Shinsou knew everything they needed to in order to settle in as quickly as possible.

* * *

Izuku had decided that he wanted to befriend Shinsou within only a few days.

He wasn't sure why, it wasn't like Shinsou was particually nice or anything. If anything, he was often defensive and snappish.

But there was something in his eyes that reminded Izuku of the way he had been, a long time ago. Back when he was quirkless, back when he was friendless and bitter and lonely.

Unfortunately, Shinsou didn't exactly appreciate his efforts.

"Why are you trying so hard to be my friend?" He snapped, making Izuku flinch reflexively.

"Why can't I want to be your friend?" Izuku retorted, focused on the lonely, sad eyes rather than the scowling face.

"Maybe because of my quirk? I could control your mind. It's a villain's quirk!" Shinsou growled.

Izuku blinked, suddenly not really seeing Shinsou, and instead a dimly lit bar with a faint smell of alcohol, with glaring red eyes in the darkness and the sharp sound of things cracking.

He shook his head, and the vision was gone.

"You're wrong. Villain's don't have special quirks. No quirk is evil." Izuku said quietly. "It's how they use their quirks. Villains can have the most mundane quirks and use them for evil. Then it's wrong... So I'm not scared of you or your quirk, Shinsou. Not if you want to be a hero."

At that, Shinsou just looked shocked. Then he laughed.

But he didn't snap at Izuku every time Izuku tried to be friendly after that... Eventually, he even started hanging out with Izuku and his friends. He did apologise to Todoroki for something, though. Izuku was never sure what, though, although he remembered that the two had fought each other in the Sports Festival, so maybe it had something to do with that.

In fact, everything seemed to be coming together. Izuku later made another friend, Kirishima.

He'd been surprised when the red-haired boy approached him after class one day. Izuku had seen him hanging around with Bakugo, and while Bakugo hadn't been unfriendly, he hadn't approached Izuku either.

It was odd, really. There were no glares, no taunts, but occasionally, Izuku would see Bakugo glancing at him with something like relief in his eyes. Izuku was never quite sure.

"I just want to thank you." The boy had said with a friendly smile. "Before you arrived here, Bakugo was in a pretty bad shape. He was moody and snapped at everyone and... well, worse than he is now. I think he was feeling guilty about something... I was kinda worried about him."

The boy laughed sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head.

"He seems happier now you're here. Less guilty and moody. For a while I thought he'd just explode. Apparently you two have some sort of history together? Eh, it doesn't really matter, I guess... Just thanks. Anyway, nice to meet you! I'm Eijiro Kirishima."

"I'm Izuku Midoriya. Nice to meet you!"

So for Izuku, surrounded by more friends than he'd ever thought possible and with each step taking him closer to his goal, his redemption, the future seemed bright and warm and promising.

Just like he'd always dreamed.


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N: Wow, this is very,** _ **very**_ **overdue... Sorry about the delay! I meant to post this like a week ago, but I was super busy so... Enjoy an extra long ending! :D**

 **Oh, and obligatory manga spoilers warning and disclaimer. I own nothing! :D**

* * *

There were good times, and then there were bad times. Even though it was the most demanding thing he'd ever done, training to become a hero made Izuku happy.

And even when things became bad, even when there were times when he felt like giving up, even when there had been times when he'd thought that he'd never recovered, he had friends there to help him put himself back together. Because that was what friends did.

Even months and months after he'd started training, he'd still sometimes wonder what he'd done to deserve such wonderful people in his life. The one time he'd ever voiced any thoughts even remotely among those lines, Uraraka had become _very_ scary.

 _"Don't say something like that Izuku. Ever."_

She'd sat him down, gathered everyone: Todoroki, Iida, Shinsou, Kirishima and even Bakugo, and they'd had a very long talk about friendship and how they were all there for him (Kirishima had elbowed Bakugo in the ribs every time he started grumbling).

Actually, Bakugo was another one of the things Izuku still found himself wondering about. Because there would be times when Bakugo would avoid him for days, then glance worridly at Izuku when he thought that he couldn't see him, like he thought Izuku would fade away if he wasn't looking.

Izuku also noticed something odd about Bakugo. It was never anything big, it was never anything drastic. But it was little things, and Izuku would notice them. Like how Bakugo started swearing less and less around Izuku when he saw Izuku flinch the first time.

Then there was also the fact that Bakugo had allowed himself to be dragged along to the entire comfort Izuku session in the first place. The old Bakugo would have had to be dragged in kicking and screaming, but this time, Bakugo had only muttered something under his breath.

And then, Izuku was never sure exactly _how,_ but the entire thing had turned into a massive group hug with tears involved. It was really confusing but it was also easily one of his best memories ever.

And when Endeavour's case was brought to court, there were more group hugs and more tears .

Todoroki stopped smiling, then. Izuku couldn't really blame him. He knew why there were shadows in Todoroki's eyes, he knew why he stopped smiling. It didn't make it okay.

Because Todoroki had been there for him, when it had mattered the most.

 _"Secondly, none of that was your fault. Why else would the villains give you quirks if they weren't going to make you do what they want?"_

So on the first day of the trial, when Todoroki's face had become as cold and as unreadable as when they had first met, Izuku had grabbed his hand- his left hand- and promised that everything would be okay in the end.

And Todoroki, remembering the boy with the messy hair and the guilty eyes he'd met all those months ago, who'd smiled awkwardly and hadn't known what to say, had managed to smile. He'd remembered how he hadn't known what to say, back when Izuku had broken down in front of him.

 _"And... And... I-I hurt p-people w-with a power that was never meant to be m-mine."_

And then, the tables had turned. Izuku was the one trying to help Todoroki as he fell apart, Izuku was the one not quite sure how to pick up the pieces. But he was trying his best, and that was enough.

So Izuku looked at Todoroki and smiled with all the warmth and certainty that Todoroki had ever needed.

"It'll all be okay, Shouto."

And the trial was still scary, the thought of it still made his blood freeze and his heart twist with anger and fear and a raw, desperate kind of _hope_ , but it seemed more approachable when he had Izuku by his side.

Then came the rest of Class 1-A, following Izuku's example. On the day of the trial, they all followed him out of the building, ready to support him when he needed it the most. Because they were heroes. Because they were his friends.

"We're here for you!" Uraraka had chirped, smiling as he stood frozen in shock.

"You didn't think we were going to let you face this alone?" Shinsou asked, raising an eyebrow.

"It would be dishonourable and unbecoming of our friendship to let you suffer through this by yourself." Iida said firmly, and the rest of the class nodded in agreement.

So at the trial, Todoroki had his entire class standing beside him. All of his friends were there, standing beside him. He wasn't alone. Not anymore. Never again.

And Endeavour was alone. No one stood beside him at the trial. His money and threats hadn't earned him friends. His cold nature hadn't endeared him to any heroes.

His money and fame couldn't help him worm his way out of the charges either. Aizawa had built up a solid case against the pro hero, and there was no chance that he could bribe or lie his way out of it.

The trial ended with Endeavour being led away, looking back at his son, who was standing tall, who was surrounded by friends, who would never be alone again.

Shouto may have imagined it, but there was something like pride in Endeavour's eyes as he was led away.

Then Shouto turned and looked away from his father, and didn't look back. He wouldn't see his father again.

Instead, he turned towards his friends, the people he'd die for, the people he'd live for, the people he'd become heroes with, and began the long walk home.

* * *

Todoroki would always remember the first time he went to visit his mother. It was shortly after the trial had been concluded, and he was finally _free._

He rememembered the way he'd frozen in front of the door, trying to work up the courage to knock. It had been a long, long time, but...

 _"It's okay for you to be a hero, if you want to be one."_

He still remembered everything. The good times, the bad times, all of it. There'd been a time when she had been the only thing keeping him sane, the only thing keeping him safe.

There had been a time when she had hurt him.

 _"Your left side... It's unsightly."_

But everything had changed since then. He'd forgiven his mother for what she'd done to him a long, long time ago. He was still working on forgiving himself for becoming so wrapped up in his own hatred, his own biterness, his own brokeness, to help her or anyone else.

 _"I... Thank you, Shouto."_

He'd found a way to move forwards, back then, and he'd find a way to move forward now.

It all started when he knocked on the door.

He'd remember the way her eyes widened with shock. He'd remember the way she'd sobbed and held him like he'd vanish at any moment.

He'd always, always remember how he'd left, feeling lighter than he had in years.

* * *

There had been a large number of disappearances in the months after Izuku had been saved. At first they were too few and too far apart for anyone to draw any conclusions, but...

But more and more quirkless people and more and more people with weak quirks had been going missing.

And then one of them had been found. She had been quirkless, a young adult living alone in a crowded city. She'd been taken one day on their walk home from her job. She'd never even made it home. And she hadn't been seen again, until there had been a violent clash between Stain's group and the League.

She'd been left alive, but she was the only one at the scene when the police arrived. She was staring vacantly forwards, eyes glassy and dull, her entire figure somehow deformed and wrong, and she was waiting for orders.

The medical scans had shown that her brain was altered, and there was no fixing her. She'd been broken, she'd been turned into a monster. She'd never go home again.

Izuku remembered when he'd been told about this. About her. About the others. The people who'd been like him, quirkless, Nomou.

All Might had been the one to break the news. He'd been offered a glass of water. Then he'd seen the folder, the blurry photo of a girl with a bright smile and sad eyes, and then the vacant stare of Nomou.

 _"Forced quirk activation."_

He imagined the static. He imagined never waking up, never getting better.

The glass fell from his grip and shattered.

He remembered something, distantly, though it was shrouded in fog and static and echoes. Stain was staring at him, cold murderous eyes brimming with horror.

 _"Those... Rumours were true. You really were behind the disappearances."_

The villains had perfected their Nomous. It clearly took longer and the damage to the Nomou was far more extensive- but more and more people would be taken and they'd be lost, drowning in a sea of static alone forever.

"I'll stop them." The words burned at his throat like the sobs that threatened to break loose, and they tasted like ash in his mouth: bitter, like pain and regret and _guilt_.

"I'll stop them and they'll never be able to hurt anyone else."

* * *

Months later, at the Provisional License Exam, the entirety of Class 1-A passed. There had been times when they'd had fun training, when they'd found time to have breaks, when they'd found time to laugh together.

But all of them had seen the news. All of them had seen the way things were steadily growing worse.

All of them had seen the reports of the dead heroes found in dark corners of cities, burned and bloodied and broken.

All of them had seen the way that quirkless people were advised not to go anywhere alone anymore.

Heroes were needed more than ever now. Heroes who were strong enough to survive. Heroes who were strong enough to stand as symbols people could look up to. Heores who were strong enough to still smile.

And the entirety of Class 1-A, having worked furiously, almost desperately rose to the challenge. Aizawa had drilled them intensively, and had waved them off with no doubt.

He wasn't disappointed either. His students, the children with the potential, the children he hadn't had the heart to expel, the children he had come to care for, were becoming the symbols of hope he always knew they could be.

* * *

The ninth holder of One for All was someone who'd lost everything. The ninth holder of One for All was someone who had fought every step of the way to get where they had stood, and then fallen with an impossible climb back ahead of them.

The ninth holder of One for All was someone who was ready to start trying again, even after everything.

All Might found his successor in a hospital room. All Might found his successor in a tragedy.

All Might had found Mirio Togata sobbing over the lifeless form of Sir Nighteye. All Might knew the story.

There'd been an attack against the Yakuza. He only knew the details because a large number of his students had been involved. Most of 1-A had sought out internships with pro-heroes, and the entire process had been well recieved. The increase in villains had meant that some of the more experienced students had been snatched away to the areas they were needed the most. The newer students were beckoned forth to fill the gaps they'd left.

There was always a demand for heroes, these days.

Neijire Hado and Tamaki Amajiki were two of those students. Both had been called away at the last minute, after some pros in an area further away had been injured in action. It was nothing personal, only that their quirks were best suited to fill the holes left in the ranks.

But it meant that Mirio was all alone when he lost everything.

 _"Aww, don't worry, we'll be back before you know it!"_

He took a bullet defending Eri, and his quirk was destroyed in the process. His mentor was injured defending his student, and Mirio watched as Sir Nighteye crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut.

 _"H-hopefully w-we'll be back before anything b-bad happens."_

All Might suspected that the raid had only gone as well it had because the Yakuza had also been weakened by the delicate situation with the villains. They had more competition and the struggle for power was fierce.

It was still a close battle, though.

Mirio hadn't really had the time to talk to any of the first year students, so he wasn't really close to them at all. Not even the three that had come to intern at the same agency as him. Although he knew them distantly, they'd never really talked- they hadn't had time.

 _"Don't worry, even if all of you are kinda new to this, I'll do my best you protect you!"_

But they'd fought desperately so he could move forwards to save Eri, and he couldn't thank them enough for that. He wouldn't regret trying to save the girl, even if it had cost him everything. Because that was what a hero did.

Most of the UA students had been unconcious or recovering when Sir Nighteye passed away. The sole exception was Mirio, who'd staggered in to the room just in time to say goodbye.

 _"You'll be an excellent hero, Mirio. I'm sure of it..."_

And then the light in the hero's eyes had vanished like frost in the sun, and Mirio knew that he'd never again have his mentor to help him, guide him, teach him. He'd never see his mentor again.

He'd lost everything. His quirk. His dream. His mentor. The world would continue without him, and he'd be left behdind, quirkless and useless to help them. He'd never be able to save a million people. Never...

 _"Remember to keep on smiling, okay?"_

All Might had arrived just in time to lose the opportunity to say goodbye, to say sorry. All Might had arrived just in time to fufill Nighteye's wish.

Because Mirio was nearly broken, because Mirio had lost everything and All Might knew it. All Might knew that Mirio woud be close to giving up. And he saw fire in those eyes. Determination and hope and sadness, but no regret.

All Might had regrets. Far, far too many. Not saving talking to Sir Nighteye in so long. Not being able to save Izuku Midoriya before it was too late. Not ever saying goodbye to Nana before she left for the last time, because he thought that she'd come back.

But choosing Mirio as his successor was not one of those regrets.

 _"Remember, Toshi. When you feel like smiling the least... That's when you need to smile the most."_

"It's okay now," he said, watching Mirio's eyes brighten, reminding him painfully of Nana, "Because I am here."

The words didn't sound hollow anymore. They sounded like a promise. And they were.

* * *

"Mirio? I... Are you okay?" His friends were hesitant when they returned. The were horrified to hear of everything that had happened when they were gone. They were horrified that they hadn't been able to be there for him.

"Don't worry Tamaki, Nejire. I'm getting there." Mirio managed a smile.

"We heard about your quirk... What happened?"

"It was that weird drug I was shot with. It changed everything." It wasn't a complete lie, but the words still tasted bitter.

 _"Remember to keep on smiling, okay?"_

Then he grinned, even if it was a little forced. "Remember those younger years I ended up working with? They turned out to be pretty cool once I got to know them, come on, I'll introduce you!"

Even though it'd take a while, Mirio would be able to smile again, and mean it. But it was okay, because he knew that Sir Nighteye would be proud, either way, and he knew his friends were waiting. And he knew he'd be able to be a hero, be able to save a million people, no matter what.

Just so long as he kept on trying, kept on smiling.

* * *

The hero known simply as Izuku didn't really gain much attention until almost a year after the incident with the Yakuza.

He wasn't trying to be anyone special. He didn't have a fancy name, he didn't need one. He wasn't Deku, he wasn't useless, quirkless. He wasn't Nomou, he wasn't a monster, a weapon. He was just Izuku, and that was nothing to be ashamed of. He was just Izuku, and he was a hero.

And in true Izuku fashion, his rise to fame wasn't simple.

* * *

Izuku Midoriya had not been having a good day.

He'd been running late to his internship with his agency- and he really couldn't afford to be late. His friends had told him it would be a bad idea to stay up late to finish analysing the quirks of the new team up of pros- but he hadn't quite been able to resist.

So it was really his own fault for oversleeping, and needing to sprint to the agency. It would be awful to be late- once again there had been a team up of agencies- all of his classmates were involved one way or another. It was a good thing, too. There had been reports of the League's activities increasing, and he could amost _feel_ the tension, the calm before the storm.

Something big would happen soon.

He just didn't think that everything would go to hell that particular day. He was on patrol, as usual. It was relatively calm, if a little busy, as usual.

Then everything was different. It started with the shrill, guttural shriek of a Nomou. It started with the screaming civilians.

Izuku remembered being calm in the chaos. He was defending the civilians in the chaos, holding back the Nomou- well, one of them- as Kirishima herded the civilians away. He was good at keeping them calm, with bright smiles and serving as an unbreakable wall.

He was dimly aware of Shouto and Urakraka and Iida fighting beside him, but he was too busy snapping in and out of Hyperfocus to properly register everything all at once. He thought he could distantly hear Kacchan's explosions.

Then: "Nomou."

It was a voice he hadn't heard in a long time. But he hadn't forgotten. He'd never forget.

 _"You're useless, Nomou!"_

Tomura Shigaraki stood in front of him, severed hands placed on his face, his cruel, insane eyes narrowed and his face was twisted in a sickening caricature of a smile.

Izuku tensed, for a brief moment remembering being scared and static and sceaming.

Then he blinked past the memories and focused on the task at hand. There were villains in front of him. Villains who were dangerous. Villains who had hurt people. Villains who would continue to hurt people.

He wasn't Nomou. He was a hero. And he would stop them, just like he promised.

"I'm not Nomou. Never again." His voice didn't shake. He was angry and afraid and everything seemed _sharper_ and all the more deadly, but none of that mattered. Not when there were lives at risk and memories to be shoving away.

Everything else was a haze. Fighting. Screaming. Hurting. Flashes of sudden, stabbing clarity. He remembered red eyes and the feeling of his skin crumbling. He remembered his friends fighting beside him. Against the Nomous, against the League, against the people who'd hurt him, hurt others.

Once upon a time, Izuku had been lonely, friendless. He'd been bullied, attacked and _lonely_ because he'd been quirkless. He'd been changed and scared and hurting when he'd been turned into a monster.

And he ended up standing tall, bleeding and hurt, but _alive_ , with his friends at his side, when he'd made himself into a hero.

That was where the story of Nomou ended. Tomura Shigaraki and Kurogiri were locked away. The League was without a leader, without a means of transportation. Nobody could quite bring themselves to trust the shadowy voice from the screen filled with static. The League was quickly picked off, and All for One, weakened and desperate found himself out of pawns.

The issue with Stain had snowballed out of control. Now the world of villains revolved around _his_ ideals, his hopes, his dreams. All for One had no influence and nowhere to run.

All Might and Mirio found him eventually. They found him, they fought him and they finally, finally defeated him.

The story of Nomou ended up with the people who'd hurt him being locked away, where they'd never be able to hurt anyone else ever again.

And that was where the story of Izuku the hero began.

After that fight with the League, they were seen as pillars. Able to block out the darkness, able to hold up the sky. They could protect people, they could _help_ people.

He had his dreams, he had suffered, and he had got better. He had found light, he had found a way forwards, he had found _friends._

And that was really all Izuku had ever wanted.

Even though there had been times when he'd been hurting, scared, lonely, not really there at all... Even though there had been times when he thought that he'd never be happy again...

He _was_ happy. He had managed everything he'd ever thought was impossible and slowly, he was inspiring other people to do things that they had thought to be impossible too.

And that is how Izuku eventually became a hero that everyone admired, could look to for comfort, for hope, for peace.

And that was more than enough.


End file.
